xvN 

MARGARET  MOORE  MATLACK 


SERGEANT  JANE 


UNIT.  OF  CALIF.  LIBRARY.  LOS  ANGELES 


Is  n't  the  house  adorable  ?  "  —  FRONTISPIECE.     See  page  65. 


SERGEANT  JANE 


BY 


MARGARET  MOORE  MATLACK 


WITH  HJ.U8TRATIONB  BT 

NANA  FRENCH  BICKFORD 


BOSTON 

LITTLE,  BROWN,  AND  COMPANY 
1940 


Copyright,  19&0, 
BT  LITTLB,  BKOWN,  AND  COMPAHT. 


All  rights  reserved 
Published  September,  1920 


NottoooU 

Set  up  and  electrotyped  by  J.  S.  Gushing  Co. 
Norwood,  Ma»s.,  U.S.A. 


So 
MY  YOUNG  SISTERS 


2131541 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I    ORDERED  SOUTH    .       .       .       i       .  1 

II    I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  AND  LEARN  A  SECRET  15 

III  ON  BOARD  THE  Guiana         .        .        .37 

IV  CHARLOTTE  AMALIE       .        .        .      ..  56 
V    WE  GO  TO  THE  CONVENT  SCHOOL        .  74 

VI    WHITES  AND  GREENS    .        .       •.        .  89 
VII    I  AM  GIVEN  A    PRESENT  AND  INTRO- 
DUCED TO  AN  OLD  FRIEND        .       .  100 
VIII    I  GO  EXPLORING    .        .        ;        .       .  115 
IX    LAZY  DAYS    .        .        ...        .  125 

X    AT  "LA  PATRIE"  .        .        .        .        .141 

XI    A  ST.  THOMAS  CHRISTMAS    .        .        .  156 
XII    THE  NEW  YEAR'S  FETE       .        .        .171 

XIII  THE  INEXPLICABLE  MURDOCK       .        .  183 

XIV  I  WRITE  A  LETTER  AND  MAKE  A  BET  195 

XV  A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  AND  A  BASKETBALL 

GAME 209 

XVI  A  VISIT  FROM  THE  COMMISSION    .        .  224 

XVII      I    DISOBEY    MY  SUPERIOR    OFFICER          .  235 

XVIII    BILLY  EXPLAINS 250 

XIX    Semper  Fidefo       .      ' .        .        .        .  265 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

"  Is  n't  the  house  adorable  ?  "  .        .        .  Frontispiece 

She  studied  her  reflection  in  the  mirror, 
smiled,  rolled  her  eyes  and  changed  to 
the  other  elbow PAGE  137 

Horrid,   ghostly  echoes   were   the   only 

answer "        241 

"  The  whole  blessed  United  States  is  our 

home"  .  "       276 


SERGEANT  JANE 

CHAPTER  I 

ORDERED  SOUTH 

"W"  ANE,  have  you  done  your  algebra  ?" 
It  was  Martha  asking  it,  of  course. 
^^    She  knew  perfectly  well  that  I  had  n't 
done  my  algebra,  or  my  English,  or  anything 
else,  for  I  had  just  come  over  from  the 
barracks  and  plunked  down  on  the  daven- 
port in  front  of  the  open  fire  to  dry  off. 
Martha  is  only  three  years  older  than  I 
am,  but  she  often  tries  to  act  as  though 
she  were  my  mother. 

"I  have  not;  and  I  'm  not  going  to," 
I  told  her  quite  frankly,  and  quickly  took 
the  offensive.  "If  you  want  to  know 
what  I  think,  Martha  Graves,  I  think  you 
ought  to  be  ashamed  of  yourself  even  to 


SERGEANT   JANE 


mention  such  —  such  trivial  things  as  les- 
sons, when  Father  is  coming  home  from 
Washington  to-night  and  will  probably 
have  his  orders  with  him ! " 

Martha  tried  to  look  scornful  and  pre- 
tended to  be  very  busy  with  her  Caesar, 
but  pretty  soon  she  came  over  and  sat  on 
the  davenport  beside  me. 

"Where  do  you  suppose  we  '11  be  sent?" 
she  demanded,  as  eagerly  as  though  that 
same  question  had  n't  been  asked  at  least 
fifty  times  a  day  since  Daddy  came  back 
from  France  the  month  before  with  three 
service  stripes  and  a  commission  as  a 
lieutenant-colonel . 

"I  told  you  I  was  betting  on  the  Philip- 
pines," I  answered  carelessly.  Martha 
hated  uncivilized  places,  so  I  always  guessed 
them. 

"But,  Jane,  we  've  been  there,"  she 
argued,  as  usual,  "and  we  've  never  been 
to  New  York  or  to  San  Francisco.  Oh! 
I  do  hope  and  pray  it 's  a  big  city ! " 


ORDERED  SOUTH 


"Wherever  it  is,  we  won't  have  as  much 
fun  as  we  Ve  had  here  at  Norfolk,"  I 
prophesied  gloomily,  kicking  the  andirons 
crossly  at  the  thought  of  leaving. 

Just  then  the  gong  rang  for  dinner,  and 
before  we  had  reached  our  favorite  "float- 
ing-island-with- jelly  "  dessert,  which  Jimmy 
reported  having  seen  in  the  kitchen,  in 
walked  Father. 

We  all  jumped  up  from  the  table  and 
rushed  at  him  shrieking:  "Did  you  get 
'em?"  "Did  you  find  out?"  "Where 
are  we  going?" 

But  he  just  smiled  and  went  over  to 
kiss  Mother,  who  was  sitting  there  as 
calmly  as  though  it  made  no  difference  to 
her  whether  we  were  sent  to  Timbuctoo  or 
the  Desert  of  Sahara.  Then  he  kissed  each 
of  us,  very  deliberately  —  which  seemed 
rather  superfluous  under  the  circumstances, 
especially  as  he  had  only  been  gone  a  day. 
We  thought  he  never  would  speak,  and 
when  he  finally  did,  it  was  only  to  ask : 


SERGEANT  JANE 


"Well,  Redhead  (my  hair  is  really  light 
brown  and  not  much  of  it  at  that,  being 
bobbed,  but  Dad  likes  to  tease)  —  Well, 
Redhead,  what  was  your  bet?" 

"Philippines,"  I  replied  promptly. 

"  Mine  was  New  York,"  Martha  shouted, 
forgetting  for  once  to  be  dignified. 

"And  mine  wath  Alathka,  to  thee  the 
Ethkimoeth,"  Jimmy  added  gravely. 

"Then  I  'm  afraid  you  all  lose,"  said 
Father,  his  eyes  twinkling.  "I'm  ordered 
to  take  charge  of  the  Marine  Base  at  St. 
Thomas,  one  of  the  Virgin  Islands." 

For  at  least  a  minute  we  were  too  dum- 
founded  to  say  a  word.  Then  we  all  began 
asking  questions  at  once,  until  Dad  put 
his  fingers  in  his  ears  and  shook  his  head 
at  us  frantically. 

"One  at  a  time,  one  at  a  time! "he 
begged.  "No,  Mother,  I  didn't  know 
myself  that  there  was  a  Marine  station 
there.  It  has  only  recently  been  estab- 
lished. 


ORDERED   SOUTH 


"Why,  Marty,  I  'm  surprised  at  you. 
Don't  they  teach  geography  and  history 
at  the  estimable  Miss  Mooney's?  The 
Virgin  Islands,  formerly  the  Danish  West 
Indies,  were  bought  by  this  country  in 
March,  1917.  St.  Thomas  is  the  next  to 
largest  of  the  three  islands  in  the  group, 
and  as  it 's  said  to  be  'on  the  way  to  every 
other  place  in  the  world ',  it  is  a  mighty  good 
spot  for  a  naval  base. 

"Where  is  it?  In  the  Atlantic  Ocean, 
about  forty  miles  south  of  Porto  Rico.  It 
is  approximately  thirteen  miles  long  by 
two  miles  wide;  the  population  is  ninety 
per  cent,  black ;  the  climate  — " 

"All  right,  Stan,"  Mother  interrupted, 
laughing.  "You  're  getting  mighty  statis- 
tical all  of  a  sudden.  What 's  that  in  your 
overcoat  pocket?" 

Dad  admitted,  with  a  chuckle,  that  he 
had  been  "studying  up  the  situation"  a 
little  coming  down  on  the  train  and  meekly 
handed  over  a  small  red  book,  with  a 


SERGEANT  JANE 


gold-lettered  title  "Our  Newest  Posses- 
sions." 

Jimmy  and  I  were  standing  with  our 
mouths  open,  not  sure  what  we  thought 
about  it  all,  but  Martha  had  evidently 
decided,  for  she  turned  to  Father,  looking 
as  though  she  were  going  to  cry  any  minute, 
and  raised  her  voice  in  protest. 

"Oh,  Father,  I  don't  want  to  go  to  a 
horrid  old  wild  island  with  nothing  but 
black  people  on  it,"  she  wailed.  "Why 
did  they  have  to  choose  you  for  that  ?  It 's 
not  fair ;  not  one  bit." 

Dad  stared  at  her  for  a  minute  and  then 
at  us,  and  I  guess  we  were  n't  looking  espe- 
cially happy  either,  for  all  the  laughter  died 
out  of  his  face,  and  he  said  almost  sternly  : 

"Those  were  my  orders,  Martha,  and 
I  did  not  care  to  dispute  them.  I  am  sorry 
that  it  means  taking  you  away  from  the 
good  friends  you  have  made  and  the  school 
you  like  so  much.  But  if  you  youngsters 
want  to  keep  on  being  the  children  of  a 


ORDERED   SOUTH 


Marine  officer  (and  we  hope  you  are  n't 
going  to  disown  us  just  yet,  don't  we, 
Mother?)  you  still  have  a  lot  of  moving 
around  before  you.  Some  places  are  bound 
to  be  more  attractive  than  others,  but  I 
thought  you  would  probably  like  the  idea 
of  going  to  any  place  as  new  and  interest- 
ing as  St.  Thomas." 

"They  will  like  it,  once  they  get  used  to 
the  thought  of  leaving,"  Mother  put  in 
quietly.  "It 's  still  hard  for  me  to  pull  up 
stakes  and  move  on  every  few  years,  and 
this  is  the  first  time  Martha  and  Jane  have 
been  old  enough  to  fully  realize  what  it 
means.  It 's  especially  hard  this  time, 
because  Norfolk  has  been  so  lovely,  and 
being  here  over  three  years  has  made  it 
seem  like  a  real  home." 

When  Mother  had  finished  her  little 
speech,  Martha  shamefacedly  murmured 
something  about  not  meaning  what  she 
had  said,  and  I  tried  to  look  as  though  St. 
Thomas  were  the  one  place  in  the  world  I 


SERGEANT   JANE 


would  have  chosen  to  go  to.  But  it  took 
Jimmy  to  say  the  truly  diplomatic  thing. 

"I  don't  care  where  we  go,"  he  assured 
Father,  with  as  much  dignity  as  though  he 
were  eighty  instead  of  eight  and  had  never 
heard  of  such  a  thing  as  losing  two  front 
teeth  and  acquiring  in  their  place  a  most 
astonishing  lisp.  "It  doeth  n't  make  any 
differenth  where  we  are,  tho  long  ath  we  are 
with  the  Marinth!" 

That  made  us  laugh,  though  Jimmy  was 
quite  hurt  that  it  should,  and  we  sat  down 
at  the  table  again  and  did  full  justice  to 

the  floating  island,  while  Daddy  read  to  us 

» 

from  "Our  Newest  Possessions." 

Afterwards  they  all  went  into  the  living 
room  to  talk  it  over  around  the  fire.  But 
I  begged  Father  to  take  me  over  to  the 
company  canteen  to  tell  the  men  the  news, 
and  Mother  finally  said  that  I  might  go  if 
I  put  on  my  raincoat  and  overshoes,  and 
took  an  umbrella,  and  did  n't  stay  more 
than  an  hour. 


ORDERED   SOUTH 


While  I  was  in  the  hall  closet  hunting  for 
my  rubbers,  I  heard  Martha  say  :  "I  don't 
see  why  you  let  her  hang  around  the  bar- 
racks all  the  time,  Mother.  Why  does  she 
want  to  be  with  those  common  men,  any- 
how?" 

Father  answered  her,  and  I  could  n't 
hear  what  he  said,  but  I  felt  sure  he  was 
standing  up  for  his  men,  for  he  loved  them 
almost  as  much  as  he  did  his  own  chil- 
dren. 

I  made  a  face  at  Martha,  in  the  dark, 
for  being  a  snob.  She  liked  the  officers 
well  enough,  and  when  once  in  a  while 
Mother  let  her  go  to  one  of  the  dances,  she 
did  her  hair  up  high  and  tried  to  look  as 
though  she  were  twenty  instead  of  just 
barely  sixteen.  Of  course  she  did  n't  de- 
ceive any  one,  but  all  the  young  lieutenants 
and  even  some  of  the  older  officers  liked  to 
dance  with  her  anyhow.  She  was  cer- 
tainly pretty,  with  her  vivid  coloring  and 
dark  hair  and  eyes,  and  a  nose  that  was 


10  SERGEANT  JANE 

nice  and  straight  instead  of  turned  up  like 
Jimmy's  and  mine. 

Personally  I  thought  most  officers  were 
silly  fops  and  could  n't  see  why  she  wanted 
to  waste  time  at  dances. 

I  had  been  thinking  all  these  things  as 
we  went  out  of  the  house  and  down  the 
long  wooden  board  walk  that  led  past  the 
mess  hall  and  over  to  the  canteen  in  one  of 
the  barracks  that  had  been  the  private  and 
exclusive  loafing  place,  since  their  return 
from  France,  of  Father's  first  company, 
"D"  of  the  -nth  Regiment.  The  rain  was 
pouring  down,  and  it  was  really  cold, 
although  almost  the  first  of  April,  and  I  was 
mighty  glad  when  we  reached  the  warm 
room. 

There  was  a  fire  burning  in  the  big  stone 
fireplace,  and  the  air  was  so  thick  with 
tobacco  smoke  that  at  first  I  could  n't 
recognize  any  one.  Then  the  men  saw 
Father's  uniform  and  sprang  to  attention; 
but  he  grinned,  banished  formality  with  a 


ORDERED   SOUTH  11 

wave  of  his  hand  and  moved  over  to  the 
fire. 

"Hey,  boys,"  some  one  shouted,  "it 's 
Sergeant  Jane  !  Come  along !" 

Dad  burst  out  laughing.  "  So  that 's 
what  they've  christened  you,  is  it?"  he 
asked.  "And  since  when  has  it  been 
customary  to  announce  a  sergeant  and 
ignore  a  colonel?" 

I  knew  he  was  only  teasing,  but  some  of 
the  men  looked  embarrassed,  so  I  changed 
the  subject  by  announcing  all  in  one 
breath : 

"We  've  been  ordered  to  St.  Thomas  of 
the  Virgin  Islands  of  the  United  States  of 
America,  and  Father 's  in  charge  of  the 
Post." 

"Hurrah  !"  "Bully  for  him !"  "Three 
cheers  for  the  Colonel !"  they  shouted,  and 
then,  in  a  regular  volley  —  "Where?" 
"What?"  "When?" 

After  we  had  taken  off  our  raincoats  and 
pulled  up  chairs  to  the  fire,  Father  told 


12  SERGEANT  JANE 

them  all  about  it,  and  he  made  it  sound  so 
interesting  that  I  could  hardly  wait  to  get 
there. 

But  when  we  got  up  to  leave  and  the 
men,  embarrassed  and  awkward,  mumbled 
"sure  will  miss  you"  and  "hate  to  see  you 
all  leave  Norfolk"  and  such  things,  I 
seemed  to  lose  interest  in  the  West  Indies. 
I  think  Dad  did,  too ;  at  least  he  was  very 
quiet  walking  home  and  held  my  arm 
tight  under  the  big  umbrella. 

But  just  as  we  came  to  the  house,  he 
chuckled  to  himself  and  asked  why  they 
called  me  sergeant. 

"  Company  D  adopted  me  for  their  mas- 
cot," I  explained.  "It  was  just  before 
they  sailed  for  France.  They  wanted  to 
make  me  a  captain,  but  of  course  I  would  n't 
be  an  officer,  so  we  corn-compromised  on 
a  non-com." 

He  laughed  some  more  at  that,  and 
insisted  upon  stopping  on  the  top  step  and 
singing: 


ORDERED  SOUTH  13 

"  Sergeant  Jane  of  the  Yank  marines, 
She  fed  her  men  on  pork  and  beans, 
Which  really  were  beyond  the  means 
Of  a  Sergeant  in  the  Army  ! " 

"Which  same  is  no  joke  in  these  days 
of  the  H.  C.  L.,"  he  added,  putting  down 
the  umbrella. 

"Hush,  Daddy,"  I  begged,  "Martha 
might  hear  you,  and  she  'd  make  fun  of 
me  forever  over  this  Sergeant  business." 

"Just  as  you  say,  my  dear,"  he  replied, 
pretending  to  become  suddenly  very  grave 
and  dignified.  "But,  since  you  have  joined 
the  marines  —  Attention,  Sergeant  Jane." 

"Yes,  sir,"  I  replied,  clicking  my  heels 
into  place. 

"You  understand  that  your  position 
demands  of  you  loyal  allegiance  to  your 
country  and  your  flag,  and  perfect  obedi- 
ence to  your  superior  officers?" 

"Yes,  sir,"  I  repeated. 

"Very  well,  then.  Sergeant  Jane,  for- 
ward march  to  bed." 


14  SERGEANT  JANE 

I  thought  that  was  taking  a  mean  advan- 
tage of  a  soldier  and  a  lady,  but  there  was 
nothing  to  do  but  obey ;  so  I  shouldered  the 
umbrella  and  marched  into  the  hall,  whis- 
tling "Semper  Fidelis"  with  much  feeling, 
if  a  trifle  off  the  key,  to  show  how  I  felt 
about  it. 


CHAPTER  II 

I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  AND  LEARN  A  SECRET 

NEARLY  a  month  after  we  had  been 
ordered  to  the  Virgin  Islands,  I 
was  having  a  farewell  game  of  ten- 
nis with  my  old  friend,  Corporal  O'Hara, 
on  the  bumpy,  grass-filled  court  back  of 
the  mess  hall,  when  Jimmy  suddenly  ap- 
peared around  the  corner  of  the  building 
and  announced  that  Mother  wanted  me  to 
come  home. 

"Oh,  Joshua !"  O'Hara  grunted.  "Ain't 
that  the  worst  luck?" 

"Maybe  I  can  come  back — "  I  began, 
but  Jimmy  interrupted  to  explain  that 
Mother  wanted  me  "right  away  and  for 
keepth."  So  I  promised  to  try  to  play 
again  before  we  left,  although  I  was  almost 


16  SERGEANT  JANE 

sure  there  would  n't  be  a  chance,  and 
followed  Jimmy  reluctantly  to  the  house. 

When  I  got  there,  everything  was  so 
quiet  that  just  dropping  my  racket  on 
the  floor  sounded  like  the  beginning  of  a 
barrage.  Mother  stuck  her  head  over  the 
railing  with  a  warning  "sh  !"  and  beckoned 
me  mysteriously  to  her  room. 

"Jane,"  she  asked,  when  I  had  stepped 
inside  and  closed  the  door  after  me,  "where 
have  you  been  ?  Don't  you  know  that  the 
Junior  Officers'  dance  is  to-night  and  I  told 
you  girls  that  you  could  n't  go  unless  you 
rested  this  afternoon?  Martha  is  sleeping 
now." 

"Oh,  Joshua!"  I  burst  out,  without 
thinking.  "Is  that  what  you  made  me 
stop  in  the  middle  of  a  deuce  set  for? 
I  'IQ  not  going  to  take  a  nap,  because  I  'm 
not  going  to  the  dance.  Oh,  Joshua!" 

"What  a  ridiculous  expression,  Jane! 
You  must  n't  use  it.  And  of  course  you  're 
going  to  the  dance.  It 's  the  last  thing 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  17 

given  in  our  honor  before  we  leave,  and 
they  will  feel  hurt  if  the  whole  family  is  n't 
there." 

"But  I  Ve  been  to  two  teas  and  that 
deadly  reception  and  the  school  concert, 
and  I  can't  stand  another  thing,  Mother. 
Please  let  me  go  play  with  O'Hara  and  stay 
home  this  evening." 

"You  're  a  funny  child,  Janey.  I  don't 
believe  many  girls  of  thirteen  would  beg  to 
stay  away  from  a  military  dance.  I  don't 
like  to  make  you  go  if  you  don't  want  to, 
dear,  but  you  need  only  stay  long  enough 
to  speak  to  some  of  the  people,  and  it  will 
be  the  last  dance  you  '11  have  to  worry 
about  for  a  long,  long  time.  Next  time 
you  go  to  one,  you  '11  have  to  beg  for  per- 
mission." 

"Then  next  time  will  be  never,"  I 
muttered.  "All  right,  I  '11  go  shake  hands 
with  the  silly  fops  this  once  more." 

And  I  stalked  out  of  the  room  before 
Mother  could  scold  me  for  saying  silly 


18  SERGEANT  JANE 

fops,  which  is  English  and  very  expressive 
but  not  supposed  to  be  used  about  officers. 

I  lay  down  on  my  bed  and  tried  to  forget 
my  troubles  in  a  detective  story,  but 
before  the  corpse-to-be  had  even  been  shot, 
in  walked  Martha,  dressed  in  her  best 
rose-colored  kimono  and  a  boudoir  cap  she 
had  resurrected  from  goodness  knows 
where.  At  first  I  did  n't  say  a  word,  for 
I  knew  she  was  just  trying  to  get  me 
excited,  but  when  she  sat  down  at  my 
dressing  table  and  began  rubbing  massage 
cream  into  her  face,  I  could  n't  stand  it  any 
longer. 

"Of  all  vain  creatures,  Martha  Graves," 
I  exploded,  "you  take  the  first  prize! 
Curlers  and  cold  cream,  and  next  I  suppose 
you  '11  be  using  rouge.  Oh,  Joshua !  You 
make  me  sick!" 

"My  dear  Jane,  where  do  you  pick  up 
such  expressions?"  Martha  looked  at  me 
the  way  Mrs.  General  Payne  does  at  any 
poor  unfortunate  woman  who  happens  to 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  19 

take  her  favorite  seat  in  chapel,  only  a  dab 
of  cold  cream  on  her  chin  and  the  bumpy 
knobs  under  the  boudoir  cap  rather  spoiled 
the  effect.  "Really,  I  can't  understand 
why  Mother  lets  you  associate  with  those 
dreadful  men  and  learn  to  use  such  vulgar 
expressions." 

"I  did  not  learn  it  from  them,  and  they 
are  n't  dreadful  and  it 's  not  vulgar,"  I 
replied  indignantly. 

"Well,  where  did  you  hear  it  then?" 

"  Why  —  why  —  I  heard  an  officer  say 
it  this  very  afternoon;  that  's  where  I 
heard  it.  It 's  his  favorite  expression." 
(O'Hara  's  as  much  of  an  officer,  in  my 
opinion,  as  the  General  himself,  but  I 
did  n't  think  it  necessary  to  explain  this 
to  Martha.) 

She  evidently  took  the  officer  for  what 
he  was  worth,  as  she  did  n't  say  anything 
further  on  the  subject.  Instead  she  began 
talking  about  the  dance,  and  the  Latin 
exam  to-morrow,  and  how  she  hated  to 


. 

20  SERGEANT  JANE 

leave  Norfolk,  and  wondering  whether  there 
.would  be  any  saxophones  in  the  band  that 
night  and  whether  there  would  be  any  nice 
people  at  St.  Thomas.  Martha  is  so  funny 
when  she  gets  started  on  a  dozen  different 
subjects  at  once  that  you  can't  help  laugh- 
ing at  her,  and  when  she  pulled  off  her  cap 
and  stood  all  her  curlers  on  end  and  did 
what  she  called  a  Virgin  Island  cakewalk, 
we  both  giggled  so  much  that  Mother 
came  in  and  scolded  us  for  not  resting. 

When  Martha  forgets  to  pretend  she  's 
grown  up  and  does  n't  remember  how 
attractive  she  is,  I  don't  know  a  better 
sport.  But  by  the  time  we  were  ready  to 
start  over  to  the  dance  that  evening,  her 
memory  was  in  extra  good  working  order, 
and  in  a  frilly  pink  and  white  organdie,  with 
her  hair  done  in  imitation  of  her  favorite 
movie  actress,  she  looked  at  least  eighteen. 

Father,  coming  down  the  stairs  in  all  the 
blue  and  red  and  gold  glory  of  his  full 
dress,  pretended  to  stagger  with  surprise. 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  21 

"Who  is  this,  Mother?  I  don't  believe 
I  Ve  been  introduced,  have  I  ? "  he  asked, 
bowing  politely  to  Martha,  who  blushed 
and  told  him  not  to  be  silly  and  please  to 
come  along,  it  was  half-past  eight. 

The  officers'  mess  hall  was  hung  with 
flags,  and  there  were  flowers  and  ferns  in 
all  the  corners.  The  Marine  Band  was  tun- 
ing up  on  a  raised  platform  at  one  end  of 
the  floor,  which  was  already  half  filled  with 
officers  and  Norfolk  girls.  The  bright-col- 
ored dresses  and  the  uniforms  moving  around 
together  looked  mighty  pretty,  I  thought. 
Even  the  dignified  receiving  line  had 
splashes  of  color  in  it.  My  own  family 
had  been  installed  at  the  head  of  the  line 
and  it  was  fun  to  watch  Father's  courtly 
bow  and  the  gracious  smile  Mother  gave 
to  new  arrivals. 

If  you  could  come  to  them  as  a  dis- 
embodied spirit,  dances  might  not  be  so 
bad,  I  decided.  And  the  next  minute  I 
found  myself,  dreadfully  conscious  of  a 


22  SERGEANT  JANE 

much  too  childish  white  dress  and  squeaky 
patent-leather  slippers,  being  dragged  out 
of  the  friendly  shelter  of  the  dressing 
room  and  into  the  very  midst  of  the  receiv- 
ing line  by  my  heartless  sister. 

For  what  seemed  like  endless  hours,  we 
stood  side  by  side  and  shook  hands  with 
benevolent  old  colonels  and  their  stately 
wives,  with  brisk,  hearty  majors  and  fop- 
pish lieutenants,  and  with  pretty  girls  and 
more  foppish  lieutenants,  and  with  captains, 
and  with  the  General  and  Mrs.  General, 
and  with  still  more  lieutenants. 

Finally  some  of  the  lieutenants  took 
Martha  away  and  began  dancing  with  her. 
After  I  had  danced  dutifully  with  Father 
and  several  nice  but  rather  stout  majors, 
Mother  took  pity  on  me  and  promised 
that  if  I  would  sit  down  beside  her  for  just 
a  few  minutes,  Father  would  take  me 
home. 

But  before  Father  could  get  away,  a 
plump,  warm-looking,  little  lieutenant 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  23 

named  Chase  came  trotting  over  to  me, 
with  another  man,  bigger  and  darker  and 
not  so  overheated,  in  tow. 

"This  is  Lieutenant  Duncan,  Redhead," 
he  remarked  patronizingly  and  disappeared. 

"I  Ve  been  hoping  to  meet  you,  Miss 
Graves,"  the  Duncan  person  began.  "  I  Ve 
heard  a  lot  about  you,  you  know." 

He  was  an  especially  young  lieutenant 
and  especially  good-looking,  so  I  knew  that 
he  must  be  even  more  than  ordinarily 
conceited  and  foppish,  and  I  did  n't  care 
how  rude  I  was. 

"You  probably  refer  to  my  sister, 
Martha,"  I  said  coldly.  "She  's  over  there 
by  the  punch  bowl.  I  'm  Jane ;  and  I  'm 
going  home  now,  anyhow." 

"But  it 's  Jane  I  'm  looking  for,"  he 
answered,  laughing  and  screwing  up  his 
face  until  he  did  n't  look  so  hopelessly 
handsome,  after  all.  "Sergeant  Jane,  that 
is.  I  bring  greetings  to  her  from  Corporal 
Timmons." 


24  SERGEANT  JANE 

"Timmons!"  I  cried,  forgetting  to  be 
even  cool.  "Where  is  he?  How  is  he? 
Does  he  remember  me?" 

"He  's  stationed  at  the  Marine  Barracks 
at  St.  Thomas  and  was  extremely  hale  and 
hearty  the  last  time  I  saw  him,  some  ten 
days  or  so  ago.  As  for  remembering  you 
—  I  should  say  about  two  thirds  of  his 
conversation  was  on  the  subject  of  Sergeant 
Jane  and  the  glorious  glory  of  Company  D  ! " 

Lieutenant  Duncan  grinned  to  himself 
at  the  thought  of  Timmons's  conversational 
limits. 

"Oh,  Joshua!  Isn't  that  great?"  I 
grinned  back.  "Just  to  think  of  his  being 
in  the  Virgin  Islands.  He  's  one  of  my 
oldest  friends  and  was  in  Father's  favorite 
company,  and  we  lost  track  of  him  after 
he  was  wounded  in  France  and  have  n't 
seen  him  or  heard  from  him  for  ages. 
Please  tell  me  all  about  him.  And  tell 
me  all  about  St.  Thomas,  because  we  Jre 
going  there  soon." 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  25 

"That 's  rather  a  large  order,  but  I  '11 
do  my  best,"  he  promised.  "That  is,  of 
course,  if  you  don't  mind  not  going  home 
just  yet  ?  " 

I  knew  he  was  laughing  at  me,  but  I 
did  n't  care,  I  was  so  anxious  to  hear  about 
Timmons,  and  besides,  Mr.  Duncan  was 
the  most  human  lieutenant  I  had  ever  met. 
1  even  danced  with  him  a  couple  of  times, 
when  he  said  he  would  have  to  be  bribed 
to  give  away  any  information  of  value  to 
the  enemy. 

Then  I  told  Father  that  Lieutenant 
Duncan  would  take  me  home,  and  after 
I  had  found  my  cape,  we  went  over  and 
sat  on  the  front  steps  of  our  house  and 
talked. 

"Timmons  was  discharged  from  the  hos- 
pital before  the  armistice  was  signed,"  he 
told  me.  "But  he  was  transferred  to  a 
different  company,  and  after  he  came  home 
was  stationed  for  a  little  while  at  Phila- 
delphia and  then  sent  to  St.  Thomas.  He 


26  SERGEANT  JANE 

knows  that  you  all  are  coming  down  there 
and  is  just  about  counting  the  days. 

"He  's  making  you  a  present,  too,"  he 
concluded.  "But  that 's  a  secret." 

I  begged  him  to  tell  me  what  it  was,  but 
instead  he  began  talking  about  his  own 
experiences  during  the  six  months  he  was 
at  St.  Thomas,  helping  to  supervise  the 
renovation  of  the  old  barracks  and  the 
building  of  new  ones,  and  putting  in 
electric  lights  and  a  garage  and  a  new 
wharf  and  all  sorts  of  improvements. 

"You  see,  I  was  an  engineer  before  I 
joined  the  marines,"  he  explained.  "After 
the  war  was  over,  I  decided  to  stick  to  the 
service  and,  as  a  reward,  I  guess  got  sent 
to  the  Virgin  Islands." 

"Did  you  like  St.  Thomas  so  much?" 
I  asked  in  surprise. 

"  Crazy  about  it.  But  you  '11  see  why 
for  yourself  when  you  get  there,  and  I  'm 
not  going  to  spoil  it  for  you  by  telling  you 
too  much  beforehand." 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  27 

"I'll  probably  hate  it,"  I  replied,  just 
to  be  contrary.  "I  don't  want  to  leave 
Norfolk  a  bit." 

"Just  wait  until  you  've  spent  a  month 
in  Charlotte  Amalie  and  see  if  you  don't 
love  it,"  he  prophesied.  "Now  come  along 
and  dance  the  rest  of  the  dances  with 
me." 

"  What  for  ?  "  I  demanded.  "  You  are  n't 
going  to  tell  me  anything  else,  and  I  'm 
sleepy." 

"I  see  it's  my  turn  to  bribe,"  he 
chuckled.  "Suppose  I  told  you  a  St. 
Thomas  secret  that  nobody  else  in  this  whole 
wide  world  knows  anything  about  ?  " 

"Then  I  would  dance  all  you  wanted  me 
to,"  I  assured  him  promptly. 

"All  right,  Sergeant  Jane.  It 's  a  go. 
But  first  you  must  swear  to  solemn  secrecy." 

"Just  how  do  you  do  that?"  I  asked 
doubtfully. 

"Kneel  down  on  the  lowest  step,"  he 
commanded.  "Lower  your  head  until  it 


28  SERGEANT  JANE 

touches  the  step  above  and  repeat  the 
alphabet  backwards." 

I  did  it  as  well  as  I  could  for  giggling; 
and  then  he  told  me  to  stand  on  the  ground 
below  him  with  my  hands  behind  my  back 
and  my  feet  crossed. 

"Now,"  he  ordered  sternly,  when  he 
had  me  fixed  to  suit  him,  "say  after  me 
slowly : 

"  If  ever  this  secret  I  betray 
Then  sky-blue-pink  may  I  turn  next  day ! " 

"Then  sky-blue-pink  may  I  turn  next 
day,"  I  repeated  meekly.  "But  why  not 
until  the  next  day  ?" 

"That 's  irrelevant  and  irreverent,"  he 
replied  sternly.  "Sit  down." 

I  was  beginning  to  be  afraid  that  all  this 
nonsense  was  because  there  really  was  n't 
any  secret,  but  as  soon  as  I  had  seated  my- 
self beside  him  on  the  steps,  he  began  in  a 
mysterious  half -whisper : 

"Once  upon  a  time  there  was  an  organi- 
zation known  as  the  Danish  West  Indies 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  29 

Company.  It  was  a  wealthy  and  powerful 
company,  with  headquarters  in  Denmark 
and  branches  in  all  the  Danish  colonies  in 
the  West  Indies.  An  especially  successful 
commerce  was  being  carried  on  with  its 
flourishing  settlement  in  St.  Thomas. 

"And  then  one  day,  out  of  a  clear  sky,  the 
British  fleet  (which  was  then,  as  now,  the 
largest  in  the  world  and  did  n't  leave  many 
places  unvisited)  came  sailing  into  the 
harbor  at  Charlotte  Amalie,  with  guns 
booming  and  flags  flying.  The  peaceful  and 
wholly  unprepared  Danes  put  up  only  the 
feeblest  resistance,  and  the  British  soon 
took  possession  of  St.  Thomas,  as  well  as 
of  its  sister  islands,  St.  John  and  St.  Croix. 

"The  people  were  unhappy  and  dis- 
satisfied under  English  occupation,  but 
fortunately  it  lasted  less  than  a  year,  for  in 
1802,  by  the  Treaty  of  Amiens,  the  islands 
were  given  back  to  Denmark. 

"But  the  Danes  had  learned  a  lesson  and 
decided  that  no  enemy  would  catch  them 


30  SERGEANT  JANE 

unprepared  again.  On  the  water  front  of 
Charlotte  Amalie  stood  a  great  red  fort 
that  had  been  erected  way  back  in  the 
seventeenth  century  by  Governor  Iverson. 
They  strengthened  its  walls,  fashioned  new 
loopholes  and  brought  in  cannon  until  it 
fairly  bristled.  Then  they  sat  down  to  wait 
for  the  British  to  start  something  again. 

"And  sure  enough,  about  five  years 
after  then'  first  conquest,  back  came  the 
English,  under  Admiral  Cochrane.  This 
time  the  St.  Thomians  put  up  a  good  fight, 
and  even  after  the  town  itself  had  sur- 
rendered, a  band  of  men  held  out  against 
the  British  for  weeks  in  the  fortress,  al- 
though they  were  besieged  from  both  land 
and  sea. 

"The  English  evidently  found  the  Virgin 
Islands  a  pretty  hot  proposition  to  manage, 
for  they  handed  them  back  again  in  1815, 
and  they  have  belonged  to  Denmark  ever 
since  —  until  the  United  States  bought 
them  two  years  ago." 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  31 

"That 's  very  interesting,"  I  said  politely, 
as  he  seemed  to  have  finished,  "and  I'm 
sure  you  would  make  a  fine  history  teacher. 
But  I  don't  see  why  it 's  a  secret." 

"Oh,  I  have  n't  gotten  to  the  secret  yet," 
he  assured  me.  "That  was  just  intro- 
duction. How  do  you  suppose  those  men 
managed  to  live  in  the  fort  for  weeks,  when 
they  were  cut  off  from  all  communication 
and  all  supplies  ?  " 

"There  weren't  any  airplanes  then,  or 
submarines.  I  don't  know  —  unless  they 
had  a  secret  passage  of  some  kind." 

"You  've  guessed  it  first  shot.  And 
finding  it  again  after  all  these  years  is  the 
secret." 

"But  where  did  it  go?  I  should  think 
the  British  would  have  been  all  around  the 
fort." 

"They  were.  But  they  trusted  to  the 
lookouts  on  the  battle  ships  to  watch  the  side 
of  the  tower  toward  the  harbor,  and  on  a 
dark  night  a  small  rowboat  could  come 


32  SERGEANT  JANE 

quietly  along  the  coast,  about  a  hundred  rods 
from  shore,  without  being  noticed  either  by 
those  lookouts  or  by  the  sentries  on  guard 
in  front  of  the  fortress." 

"But  where  did  it  land?  And  how  did 
they  get  into  the  fort?  " 

"There  is  a  narrow  strip  of  land  around 
the  building,  on  which  they  evidently 
beached  their  boats.  In  one  of  the  walls 
facing  the  sea  is  a  cunningly  contrived 
stone  door,  which  opens  into  a  long  narrow 
room  or  passage.  At  the  other  end  of  this 
passage  is  the  door  leading  into  the  cellar 
of  the  fortress." 

"That  is  a  regular  secret,"  I  admitted. 
"How  did  you  ever  happen  to  discover  the 
passage,  and  how  did  you  find  out  what  it 
had  been  used  for?" 

"We  were  getting  ready  to  use  the  fort 
as  a  hospital  and  guardhouse  for  our  men, 
and  I  was  poking  around  in  the  cellar  to 
see  how  damp  it  was,  when  I  accidentally 
touched  one  of  the  hinges  of  the  secret  door. 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  33 

The  key  was  rusted  in  the  lock  on  the 
cellar  side.  When  I  finally  managed  to 
turn  it  and  get  into  the  room  on  the  other 
side,  I  found  it  as  musty  and  cobwebby 
as  though  it  had  n't  been  disturbed  since 
the  loyal  Danes  brought  up  their  last  load 
of  supplies  to  their  townsmen  imprisoned 
in  the  fort  over  a  hundred  years  ago.  And 
I  don't  believe  it  had." 

"But  how  did  you  know  about  the 
Danes?"  I  persisted. 

"That 's  partly  guesswork,"  he  ad- 
mitted with  a  laugh.  "But  I  talked  with 
a  lot  of  old  inhabitants  and  hunted  up 
some  local  histories,  and  I  got  enough  dope 
to  build  up  my  theory." 

"And  then  what  did  you  do?"  I  asked 
eagerly. 

"Nothing  very  romantic,  I'm  afraid. 
I  cleaned  out  the  room  in  the  walls,  after 
I  'd  located  the  other  end  of  the  pas- 
sage, of  course,  and  I  took  down  an  old 
rug  and  some  chairs  and  pillows  and 


34  SERGEANT  JANE 

rigged  up  an  electric  light,  and  on  blazing 
hot  days  I  bet  I  had  the  coolest  loafing 
place  on  the  whole  island.  I  never  told 
anybody  about  it,  and  when  I  came  away 
I  locked  it  up  and  left  it  just  as  it  was, 
hoping  that  sometime  I  could  go  back  and 
visit  it  again.  But  you  have  the  secret, 
so  I  'm  going  to  give  you  the  key,  too." 

And  before  I  could  protest  he  had  un- 
buttoned his  coat,  taken  from  around  his 
neck  a  long  chain  with  a  big,  old-fashioned 
key  hanging  from  it  and  handed  the  whole 
thing  to  me. 

"The  outer  door  opens  to  the  touch,  on 
a  sort  of  spring,  I  suppose,  so  this  is  all  you 
need  to  get  into  our  secret,"  he  said. 

"But  I  don't  want  to  take  your  key," 
I  protested.  "Suppose  you  come  back 
some  day  and  want  to  get  in." 

"Then  you  '11  have  to  be  there  to  open 
the  door.  I  have  a  hunch  you  will,  too. 
And  now  let 's  dance." 

We  went  back  to  the  mess  hall  and  were 


I  GO  TO  A  DANCE  35 

just  starting  to  waltz,  when  I  happened  to 
hear  Martha's  voice,  which  is  rather  high 
and  very  carrying  when  she  is  excited. 
"Oh,  Joshua!  Isn't  the  music  gor- 
geous?" she  was  exclaiming  to  her  part- 
ner. 

That  made  me  giggle,  and  when  I  began 
wondering  how  many  times  she  had  used 
that  "vulgar  expression"  under  the  mis- 
taken impression  that  it  was  the  pet  slang 
of  some  especially  witty  officer,  I  laughed 
until  I  got  entirely  out  of  step.  Lieu- 
tenant Duncan  stopped  dancing  in  disgust 
and  took  me  over  and  made  me  sit  down  in 
the  corner  and  explain. 

He  roared  when  I  told  him  about  it,  and 
said  that  he  was  going  to  ask  Martha 
to  dance  with  him,  and  when  she  sprang 
her  "Oh,  Joshua!"  he  was  going  to  say 
very  ecstatically:  "Oh,  Miss  Graves,  how 
did  you  know  my  first  name?" 

But  before  he  had  a  chance  to  try  it,  the 
band  began  playing  "  Good  Night,  Ladies," 


36  SERGEANT  JANE 

and  Mother  suddenly  appeared  and  hauled 
me  into  line  to  shake  hands  all  over  again 
and  say  what  a  lovely  time  I  had  had. 

Before  I  went  to  bed  I  took  the  key  off 
the  chain,  which  was  too  heavy  to  wear, 
and  put  it  around  my  neck  on  the  blue 
ribbon  out  of  my  nightgown.  I  started  to 
put  it  down  my  back,  to  act  as  a  cure  for 
nosebleeds  in  case  I  ever  had  any,  but  I  was 
afraid  Martha  would  see  it  when  she  fas- 
tened my  button-in-the-back  dresses,  so 
I  let  it  dangle  romantically  over  my  heart. 


CHAPTER  III 

ON  BOARD  THE  GUIANA 

WE  sailed  from  New  York  on  the 
Guiana  on  the  fifteenth  of  May. 
But  first  we  went  up  and  stayed 
for  a  week  at  one  of  the  big  hotels,  so  that 
we  could  buy  clothes  and  other  things  that 
we  thought  would  be  hard  to  get  hi  the  Vir- 
gin Islands. 

Mother  bought  us  both  Norfolk  suits 
with  plaid  skirts  and  dark  blue  coats,  to 
wear  on  the  boat,  and  blue  sailor  hats  to 
match,  and  new  capes  and  shoes  and  stock- 
ings and  all  sorts  of  thin  dresses,  —  voiles 
and  ginghams  and  pongees  and  other  ma- 
terials I  did  n't  even  know  the  names  of. 
Martha  said  it  was  almost  as  good  as  getting 
a  trousseau,  but  I  told  her  I  felt  more  like 


38  SERGEANT  JANE 

an  explorer,  collecting  his  outfit  for  a 
plunge  into  some  savage  wilderness. 

When  we  were  n't  shopping,  we  went  to 
the  theater  or  the  Hippodrome  or  the 
movies,  or  walked  up  and  down  Fifth 
Avenue,  looking  at  the  people  and  the  shops, 
and  stopping  every  now  and  then  for  a 
fudge  sundae  at  Huyler's  or  hot  chocolate 
and  English  muffins  in  some  specially 
quaint  or  attractive  tearoom.  Daddy  kept 
saying  that  we  were  "tasting  our  last  for 
some  time  of  the  fruits  of  civilization,  and 
we  had  better  make  the  best  of  them",  and 
we  took  him  at  his  word. 

One  afternoon  Mother  had  to  have  a 
suit  tried  on,  and  Father  was  tending  to 
some  official  business,  so  we  decided  to  take 
Jimmy  to  the  Zoo.  It  was  lots  of  fun,  but 
nothing  exciting  happened  until  we  were 
coming  home.  Then  people  were  shoving 
so  to  get  on  the  trolley  car  that  Martha 
and  Jimmy  were  pushed  in  ahead  of  me, 
and  the  conductor  suddenly  shut  the  door 


ON  BOARD  THE  GUIANA  39 

in  my  face  and  gave  the  signal  to  start. 
I  was  wondering  what  in  the  world  I  was 
going  to  do,  as  I  did  n't  have  a  cent  with 
me,  when  the  car,  which  was  just  beginning 
to  get  under  way,  stopped  with  an  awful 
jerk,  and  the  door  flew  open.  The  con- 
ductor stuck  his  head  out,  beckoned  to  me 
and  shouted,  "Jane  !  Jane  !" 

I  was  so  astonished  I  just  stood  there  until 
some  one  gave  me  a  friendly  boost,  and  I 
was  squeezed  on  to  the  platform  of  the  car. 
All  the  passengers  were  grinning,  and  some 
of  them  laughing  out  loud,  and  Martha 
was  standing  there,  looking  very  stiff  and 
dignified  and  clutching  Jimmy,  who  stam- 
mered and  giggled  and  finally  overcame 
her  frantic  attempts  to  keep  him  from 
speaking. 

"Thithter,  thithter,  oh,  Jane,"  he  stut- 
tered, "when  thithter  thaw  you  were  thut 
out,  the  thaid  to  the  conductor  —  'Pleath, 
conductor,  pleath  let  Jane  get  on;  the 
hath  n't  any  money ! ' " 


40  SERGEANT  JANE 

Of  course  Martha  denied  it  outright,  but 
the  conductor  had  certainly  called  me  Jane, 
and  we  teased  her  about  it  until  she  blushed 
at  the  sight  of  a  blue  uniform  with  brass 
buttons. 

When  the  fifteenth  finally  came,  a  lot  of 
Father's  friends  and  some  of  the  marines 
from  Norfolk,  who  had  come  up  to  New 
York  on  leave,  were  down  at  the  wharf  to 
see  us  sail.  As  the  ship  moved  slowly  into 
the  harbor,  behind  her  busy  little  tug,  we 
stood  at  the  rail  and  waved  and  waved 
until  we  could  n't  see  a  single  khaki-clad 
figure.  Then  we  waved  to  the  Woolworth 
Building  and  the  Metropolitan  tower  and 
the  whole  good,  old  sky  line  and  began  to 
feel  homesick  and  blue  and  lonely,  until 
Jimmy,  giving  one  last  flip  of  his  cap  for 
good  measure,  shouted  blithely : 

"Hi,  everybody,  come  on  down  to  the 
thateroomth  and  thee  all  the  thtuff !" 

"Yes,  we  'd  better  go  get  our  things 
straightened  out  a  little,"  Mother  agreed 


ON  BOARD  THE  GUIANA  41 

with  a  smile,  although  I  was  sure  I  had 
seen  her  wipe  away  a  perfectly  good  tear 
the  moment  before. 

We  all  went  tumbling  down  the  stairs 
and  found  our  three  staterooms  piled  with 
flowers  and  baskets  of  fruit  and  boxes  of 
candy. 

"Um'm  —  chocolate  peppermints!"  I 
cried,  opening  a  big  box  bearing  my  name. 
The  envelope  inside  was  addressed  to 
"Sergeant  Jane,"  and  I  hastily  stuck  it  in 
the  pocket  of  my  coat,  but  the  rest  of  the 
family  were  too  busy  with  their  own 
packages  to  notice.  The  card  was  Lieu- 
tenant Duncan's,  and  on  the  back  of  it  was 
written  "Good  luck  and  bon  voyage  to  the 
Wearer  of  the  Key!" 

I  hurriedly  felt  for  the  key  and  found  it 
safe,  and  then  and  there  resolved  to  explore 
the  passage  as  soon  as  I  got  to  St.  Thomas 
and  to  write  Lieutenant  Robert  James 
Duncan  all  about  it. 

By  the  time  we  had  put  the  flowers  in 


42  SERGEANT  JANE 

water,  sampled  most  of  the  other  presents 
and  unpacked  a  few  of  our  belongings,  the 
gong  rang  for  dinner,  and  as  we  hurried  down 
to  the  dining  saloon  we  began  to  feel  that 
we  were  really  on  our  way  to  the  Virgin 
Islands. 

None  of  us  had  been  on  a  big  steamer 
since  we  came  up  from  the  Philippines  six 
years  before,  so  Jimmy  and  I  explored 
every  inch  of  the  boat  from  the  bridge 
to  the  engine  room  and  had  long  talks 
with  the  purser  and  the  second  officer,  a 
Mr.  Blum,  who  was  red-faced  and  jolly 
and  said  he  had  a  little  boy  just  Jimmy's 
age. 

"Can't  you  have  it  a  little  rougher  for 
uth,  thir?"  Jimmy  asked  him  politely, 
the  second  day  out,  for  the  sea  had  been  as 
smooth  as  a  lily  pond. 

Mr.  Blum  threw  back  his  head  and 
roared  good-naturedly  at  Jimmy's  request. 
"Well,  Sonny,"  he  said  gravely,  after  a 
minute's  consideration,  "I  don't  believe 


ON  BOARD  THE  GUIANA  43 

I  have  much  influence  in  that  direction 
myself,  but  I  could  introduce  you  to  the 
wireless  operator." 

"Oh,  could  we  thee  him?"  Jimmy  asked 
delightedly,  and  I  did  n't  hang  back  either 
when  Mr.  Blum  said,  "Sure  thing;  come 
along",  and  started  up  the  stairs. 

We  followed  him  to  a  little  room  opening 
on  to  the  upper  deck,  where  a  young  man, 
with  red  hair  and  thousands  of  freckles 
was  sitting  in  front  of  a  table  covered  with 
instruments  and  papers  and  rolls  of  some- 
thing that  looked  like  the  ticker  tape  I  had 
once  seen  in  a  broker's  office. 

"Here  are  some  friends  of  mine,  Mc- 
Kinney,"  said  the  second  officer.  "They 
would  like  to  talk  to  you  a  little,  if  you  can 
spare  the  time." 

"Sure,  it's  time  I  have  plenty  of  just 
now,"  McKinney  grinned  amiably.  "And 
what  can  I  be  after  doing  for  you?" 

"Could  you  tell  us  a  little  about  the 
wireless  and  show  us  how  it  works?"  I 


44  SERGEANT  JANE 

asked  eagerly,  for  I  had  never  been  so  close 
to  one  before. 

"And  Mithther  Blum  thaid  maybe  you 
could  thee  about  having  the  weather  a  little 
rougher,"  Jimmy  added  bashfully,  as  the 
kind-hearted  second  officer  left  us  to  go  back 
to  his  duties. 

"Faith,  and  it 's  the  right  station  you  Ve 
called  this  time,  both  of  you,"  the  operator 
assured  us.  "This,  you  '11  notice,  is  my 
highly  educated  young  transmitter,"  he 
said,  pointing  to  one  set  of  instruments. 
"It  sends  out  the  messages  for  me.  And 
here  's  my  faithful  receiver  that  takes  them 
in  as  fast  as  the  best." 

"But  I  thought  it  was  a  wireless  tele- 
graph, and  there  are  a  lot  of  wires ! "  I 
exclaimed  in  surprise. 

"Sure,  those  are  the  wires  that  make  the 
current,"  he  explained.  "But  once  the 
messages  are  started,  they  're  carried  by 
waves  of  electricity  through  the  air.  Watch, 
now ;  I  'm  going  to  tap  this  little  key." 


ON  BOARD   THE  GUIANA  45 

As  he  pressed  his  finger  lightly  on  the  key, 
there  was  a  loud  cracking  noise,  and  a 
bright  spark  leaped  between  the  two  brass 
knobs  in  which  the  wires  ended. 

"Goodneth!"  cried  Jimmy.  "What 
wuth  that?" 

"That  was  a  dot,"  said  McKinney, 
laughing,  "and  this  is  a  dash."  He  touched 
the  key  again,  this  time  making  a  regular 
stream  of  sparks  between  the  knobs. 
"That 's  how  we  spell  out  our  messages  — 
dot,  dash,  dash,  that 's  W.  I  'm  calling 
the  Washington  station  up  on  the  Potomac 
to  see  about  the  weather  for  the  young 
gentleman." 

Fascinated,  we  watched  him  tap  out  the 
letters  over  and  over  again.  Suddenly  one 
of  the  other  instruments  began  tapping  of  its 
own  accord. 

"It  'th  the  retheiver!"  Jimmy  shrieked. 

"Right  you  are,"  answered  McKinney. 
"We  Ve  got  them  now."  And  he  began 
rapidly  tapping  out  his  message  on  the  key. 


46  SERGEANT  JANE 

Soon  he  stopped,  and  turning  to  the 
receiver,  picked  up  the  end  of  the  roll  of 
paper  tape  connected  with  it. 

"When  the  waves  they  '11  soon  be  sending 
back  to  us  in  reply  to  our  questions  reach 
this  little  glass  tube  (which  is  called  by  the 
name  of  coherer),"  he  told  us,  pointing  to 
the  different  things  as  he  mentioned  them, 
"those  bits  of  nickel  and  silver  floating 
around  in  there  between  the  two  plugs  join 
together  and  by  so  doing  make  it  possible 
for  the  current  to  pass  on  through  them 
and  through  these  various  wires  and  mag- 
nets until  it  sets  this  inker  moving." 

And  sure  enough,  in  a  few  minutes  the 
filings  suddenly  flew  together,  and  the 
inker  began  tapping  on  the  roll  of  tape, 
which  unwound  of  its  own  accord  as  the 
message  grew  longer. 

"How  does  it  know  what  to  tap?"  I 
asked. 

"Each  wave  of  electricity  that  makes 
it  move  corresponds  with  a  dot  or  a  dash 


ON  BOARD   THE  GUIANA  47 

made  in  that  other  wireless  station.  Here," 
he  said,  as  the  tapping  ceased,  tearing  off 
the  tape  and  handing  it  to  me,  "you  and 
the  boy  can  spell  this  out  for  yourselves 
while  I  get  off  some  other  messages." 

He  pulled  up  two  chairs  for  us  on  the 
opposite  side  of  the  table  and  gave  me  a 
little  red  book,  open  at  a  page  of  dots  and 
dashes. 

"  It  'th  the  Morthe  code,"  Jimmy  whis- 
pered reverently,  as  we  bent  our  heads  to- 
gether over  the  little  black  marks.  "I  feel 
jutht  like  a  detective  thtory." 

Slowly  and  with  frequent  assistance  from 
our  agreeable  Irish  friend,  we  spelled  out 
the  message,  and  I  wrote  it  down : 

"Weather  cloudy  in  Eastern  and  South- 
eastern States.  Storm  center  moving  down 
from  the  Great  Lakes.  Also  indications  of 
heavy  winds  from  north  during  next  twenty- 
four  hours." 

"Looks  as  though  you  '11  be  having  a  bit 
of  a  blow  yet,  young  man,"  McEanney 


48  SERGEANT  JANE 

remarked,  when  we  had  finished.  "And 
then  we  '11  have  a  chance  to  see  what  sort 
of  a  sailor  you  are." 

"  I  'm  not  any  kind  of  a  thailor,"  Jimmy 
retorted  indignantly,  "I  'm  a  marine." 

And  after  that  I  naturally  had  to  explain 
who  we  were  and  where  we  were  going. 

"Well,  well,  so  you  're  bound  for  St. 
Thomas."  The  wireless  operator  squinted 
his  eyes  reflectively.  "  It 's  an  extremely 
pretty  spot ;  but  I  don't  believe  I  'd  want 
to  live  there  all  year  round.  Still,  they  're 
talking  of  putting  in  a  big  wireless  station, 
and  in  that  case  I  might  consider  it."  He 
patted  the  coherer  lovingly  and  became 
greatly  embarrassed  when  I  tried  to  thank 
him  for  his  kindness. 

"  Come  again,  come  again ! "  he  shouted 
after  us  as  we  left.  "  Next  time  I  '11  teach 
you  how  to  send  a  message  yourselves." 

"  Wath  n't  that  fun,  Jane  ? "  demanded 
Jimmy,  skipping  along  the  deck  to  relieve 
his  feelings.  "If  I  weren't  going  to  be  a 


ON  BOARD  THE  GUIANA  49 

general  of  the  marineth  or  a  cowboy  I  think 
I  Jd  be  a  wireleth  operator." 

"I  'd  like  it  myself,"  I  admitted.  "Only 
it  would  have  to  be  on  a  boat.  I  adore 
everything  about  boats  —  the  little  boxes  of 
staterooms,  and  the  shiny  white  decks,  and 
the  portholes,  and  the  smell  of  the  ocean." 

"And  the  good  thingth  to  eat,"  Jimmy 
added,  sniffing  the  air  hungrily.  "Don't 
you  think  dinner  mutht  be  motht  ready  ?" 

After  dinner  we  sat  in  our  steamer  chairs, 
and  Father  told  us  about  the  transports 
and  the  part  the  wireless  played  in  fighting 
the  submarines  and  in  the  maneuvers  of  the 
battleships,  and  about  brave  operators  who 
had  to  stick  to  their  posts  while  the  ship  was 
sinking.  Jimmy  was  keenly  interested  at 
first,  but  he  fell  asleep  in  the  middle  of  the 
last  story,  and  Father  had  to  carry  him  to 
his  stateroom.  It  was  so  cold  and  windy 
by  that  time  that  we  all  decided  to  turn  in 
early. 

It  seemed  as  if  I  had  just  fallen  asleep 


50  SERGEANT  JANE 

when  Martha  woke  me  up  by  shouting  my 
name  over  and  over  again.  I  tried  to  lean 
out  of  my  berth  to  see  her,  but  she  was 
directly  under  me,  and  the  ship  was  rolling 
so  that  I  nearly  fell  out  on  my  head. 

"What's  the  matter?"  I  demanded. 

"I  'm  dying,"  she  announced  dramati- 
cally. "But  it  does  n't  make  any  differ- 
ence, because  the  ship  is  sinking  anyhow." 

"You  're  probably  just  seasick,"  I  called 
down  to  her.  "This  isn't  anything;  it's 
just  a  —  a  —  a  bit  of  a  blow." 

A  hollow  groan  was  the  only  answer  to 
these  words  of  comfort,  so  I  decided  I  'd 
better  investigate.  Waiting  until  the  state- 
room was  somewhere  nearly  on  a  level  (the 
boat  really  was  tossing  around  in  a  most  un- 
settling manner),  I  turned  over  on  my  face 
and  cautiously  slid  down  until  my  feet 
could  touch  the  edge  of  Martha's  berth. 
Just  as  I  reached  it,  the  boat  gave  an  awful 
lurch  and  threw  me  right  on  top  of  my 
beloved  sister.  I  landed  with  both  arms 


ON  BOARD  THE  GUIANA  51 

around  her  neck,  but  I  did  n't  stay  in  that 
affectionate  position  long,  for  with  an 
awful  yell  she  tried  to  push  me  away  and, 
losing  her  balance,  as  we  went  head  on  into 
another  wave,  succeeded  in  landing  both 
of  us  with  a  mighty  bump  on  the  floor  of 
the  stateroom. 

Martha  was  first  to  recover  her  breath. 
Sitting  up  with  great  dignity  (and  on  my 
left  leg),  she  rubbed  the  back  of  her  head 
and  demanded  ferociously  what  I  "meant 
by  it." 

"Wow!  Get  off  my  leg,  can't  you!" 
I  howled,  trying  to  kick  her  away. 
"What 'd  I  mean  by  what?"  I  was  still 
flat  on  my  back  and  not  feeling  partic- 
ularly affable. 

"By  jumping  on  top  of  me  and  waking 
me  up,  of  course,"  she  snapped  back. 
"I  suppose  that 's  your  idea  of  a  joke." 

"You  're  the  one  who  did  the  waking  up, 
Martha  Graves,"  I  replied  indignantly, 
"and  you  know  it  perfectly  well.  You 


52  SERGEANT   JANE 

called  me  and  said  you  were  dying  and  the 
ship  was  sinking  and  —  " 

"I  did  no  such  thing." 

"You  did." 

"  I  did  n't.     You  dreamt  it." 

"I  did  hot.  You  must  have  been  talking 
in  your  sleep." 

We  glared  at  each  other  fiercely;  and 
then,  at  the  same  moment,  burst  out  laugh- 
ing. It  was  so  silly  to  be  sitting,  with 
nothing  on  but  our  nightgowns,  on  a  state- 
room floor  that  stood  first  on  one  end  and 
then  on  the  other,  in  the  middle  of  the 
night  and  of  the  Atlantic  ocean,  fighting 
about  which  one  of  us  had  been  having  a 
nightmare. 

We  climbed  back  into  our  berths  without 
another  word  and  were  soon  asleep  again. 
Next  morning,  although  I  was  sure  that 
Martha  had  really  called  me,  I  decided  not 
to  mention  it  to  the  rest  of  the  family  and 
tried  to  hide  the  stiffness  in  my  left  leg  and 
shoulder  that  was  the  natural  result  of  my 


ON  BOARD   THE  GUIANA  53 

sudden  close  contact  with  the  stateroom 
floor.  Martha,  also,  had  nothing  to  say  on 
the  subject,  but  I  noticed  her  rubbing  the 
back  of  her  head  several  times  when  she 
thought  no  one  was  looking. 

The  boat  was  still  rolling  quite  a  lot,  and 
the  waves  looked  tremendously  high  and 
savage.  Jimmy  was  much  impressed  by 
the  "storm",  until  he  had  paid  an  early 
morning  visit  to  McKinney,  after  which  he 
spoke  of  it  contemptuously  as  a  "pocket  of 
wind"  and  strode  around  the  decks  with  a 
carelessness  that  brought  him  a  couple  of 
hard  bumps. 

We  all  enjoyed  the  rough  weather  and 
were  sorry  when,  late  in  the  afternoon,  the 
wind  died  down,  and  the  waves  flattened 
out  into  harmless  little  swells. 

But  the  last  two  days  of  the  trip  passed 
only  too  quickly.  We  stopped  at  Porto 
Plata  and  went  on  shore  for  a  couple  of 
hours  while  they  unloaded  freight  from  the 
steamer. 


54  SERGEANT  JANE 

"I  never  saw  such  a  clean  city  in  all  my 
life,"  Martha  had  exclaimed  when  she  first 
made  out  its  houses  and  streets  from  the 
upper  deck  of  the  boat.  And  when  we  had 
walked  around  it  for  a  while,  we  found  that 
it  was  just  as  clean  as  it  looked.  Most  of 
the  houses  were  white  and  very  small, 
with  little  patches  of  bright  green  grass  in 
front  of  them,  so  that  it  looked  like  nothing 
in  the  world  so  much  as  a  dolls'  toy  village. 

"These  people  could  teach  a  few  things 
to  some  of  our  would-be  municipal  re- 
formers and  contractor  street  cleaners," 
Father  remarked,  and  every  one  agreed 
with  him. 

The  steamer  also  stopped  at  Guantanamo 
and  Port  au  Prince,  but  not  long  enough  to 
go  on  shore,  so  we  had  to  content  ourselves 
with  throwing  pennies  to  the  little  brown 
boys  who  came  out  in  canoes  to  dive  for 
them.  They  were  wonderfully  quick  and 
clever,  and  I  saw  Jimmy  watching  them 
with  such  open-eyed  interest  that  I  sus- 


ON  BOARD  THE  GUIANA  55 

pected  another  life-ambition  was  being 
born,  and  we  would  have  to  watch  that  he 
did  n't  drown  himself  at  the  first  oppor- 
tunity. 

At  last,  on  the  sixth  morning  out,  just 
at  daybreak,  St.  Thomas  was  sighted. 
We  all  hurried  into  our  clothes  and  rushed 
down  for  a  bite  of  breakfast  before  we 
should  reach  the  island. 


CHAPTER  IV 

CHARLOTTE  AMALIE 

CHARLOTTE  AMALIE,  the  harbor 
of  St.  Thomas,  is  on  the  south  side 
of  the  island.  As  the  steamer 
slowly  made  its  way  up  the  channel,  we 
saw  that  St.  Thomas  itself  was  long  and 
narrow,  with  flat  meadows  along  the  coast 
that  sloped  back  into  high,  irregular  hills. 
Surrounding  it  were  a  great  number  of  tiny 
islands,  some  grass-covered  and  some  rocky. 

The  second  officer,  who  had  joined  us  on 
the  upper  deck,  told  us  some  of  their  names, 
—  Water  Island,  Hans  Lollick,  Little  Hans 
Lollick,  Thatch  Cay. 

"Over  there,"  he  said,  pointing  to  the 
southwest,  "is  Sail  Rock.  You  can't  see 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  57 

it  very  well  from  here,  but  looking  at  it  on 
the  eastward  side,  you  might  easily  mistake 
it  for  a  vessel  under  sail. 

"There  's  a  local  yarn  about  it  that 's 
rather  good,"  he  went  on,  seeing  that  we 
were  interested.  "It  seems  that  a  French 
frigate  was  sailing  these  waters  a  good 
many  years  ago  and  one  rather  dark  night 
passed  close  to  a  vessel  that  was  showing 
no  lights.  The  captain  thought  he  had 
come  across  a  privateersman,  and  he  hailed 
the  stranger. 

"'Ship  ahoy!  What  name  and  where 
bound?'  he  shouted. 

"'Ship  ahoy!  What  name  and  where 
bound  ? '  came  the  reply  very  faintly. 

"Indignant  at  this  impertinence  and  not 
being  able  to  get  any  satisfactory  answer 
to  his  question,  the  captain  ordered  his  men 
to  fire.  The  booming  noise  that  greeted 
his  first  volley  convinced  him  that  the 
privateersman  was  giving  battle,  and  soon 
a  couple  of  cannon  balls  landed  on  his  deck. 


58  SERGEANT  JANE 

He  was  furious  at  this  and  gave  orders  to 
keep  up  the  fight  to  the  finish. 

"When  dawn  came,  the  Frenchmen  found 
themselves  firing  away  at  Sail  Rock.  The 
supposed  answers  to  the  captain's  hails  had 
been  the  echoes  from  the  rocks  and  so  had 
the  sounds  of  return  cannonading,  while 
some  of  the  Frenchmen's  balls  had  rico- 
cheted from  Sail  Rock  at  such  an  angle  as 
to  return  to  their  own  decks.  Needless  to 
say,  they  beat  a  hasty  retreat  from  the 
neighborhood,  but  some  one  must  have 
been  a  witness  to  their  blushes,  for  the 
story  still  persists." 

Just  as  Mr.  Blum  finished  speaking,  we 
rounded  a  last  promontory  and  were  in  the 
harbor.  The  sun  had  not  been  up  for  long, 
and  there  were  still  great  masses  of  pink 
and  lavender  clouds  in  the  eastern  sky. 
The  water  in  the  harbor  was  a  clear,  bright 
blue,  and  between  that  blue  and  the  dark 
green  of  the  hills  rising  in  the  background 
lay  Charlotte  Amalie.  Every  house  in  the 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  59 

town  seemed  a  different  color,  blue,  red, 
orange,  lavender,  —  and  down  by  the  water 
front  rose  the  great  red  walls  of  Christian's 
Fort. 

"There  she  is!"  the  second  officer's 
voice  boomed  in  the  sudden  silence  that  had 
fallen  on  us  all.  "  Charlotte  Amalie  —  the 
sweetheart  of  the  West  Indies.  Do  you 
wonder  they  call  her  that?" 

"Indeed  I  don't,"  Father  replied  almost 
reverently.  "It  makes  me  think  of  a 
handful  of  precious  stones  spilled  out  on 
a  piece  of  green  velvet." 

"Or  a  greenhouse  full  of  many  kinds  of 
flowers,"  Mother  suggested.  "We  loved 
the  little  coast  towns  of  Italy,  Stan,  but 
Charlotte  Amalie  seems  to  be  all  that  they 
were  and  more,  too." 

We  spent  the  time  until  we  reached  the 
wharf  pointing  out  to  each  other  new  color 
combinations  in  the  houses,  whose  roofs 
seemed  always  to  be  of  scarlet ;  the  narrow, 
winding  streets  that  straggled  up  from  the 


60  SERGEANT   JANE 

water  front,  so  steep  sometimes  that  steps 
were  cut  in  them ;  the  gray  ruin  on  a  hill 
above  the  town,  which  Mr.  Blum  told  us 
was  Bluebeard's  castle,  and  the  dazzling 
whitewashed  fences  around  the  gardens  of 
the  hillside  villas. 

But  the  thing  that  looked  best  to  us  as  we 
came  down  the  gangplank  was  a  company 
of  our  own  blessed  marines !  They  were 
drawn  up  at  attention,  and  the  Major  who 
had  been  temporarily  in  charge  of  the  Post, 
awaiting  Father's  arrival,  was  at  their 
head.  He  saluted  Father  and  then  shook 
hands  with  him  and  with  all  of  us,  gave 
orders  about  our  baggage  and  escorted 
us  to  the  big,  rather  battered-up-looking 
car  that  was  waiting  for  us. 

"There  are  a  good  many  of  us  at  the 
barracks,"  he  explained,  patting  the  side 
of  the  car,  "and  the  one  jitney  we  have  is 
kept  pretty  busy.  This  old  lady  has  rather 
lost  her  good  looks  on  these  rotten  roads, 
but  she  still  can  go  —  eh,  Sergeant  ?" 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  61 

The  sergeant  had  been  bending  over  the 
engine,  but  now  he  stood  up  straight  and 
saluted.  When  I  saw  his  wrinkled,  brown 
face  and  merry  blue  eyes,  I  forgot  all  about 
formality  and  regulations  and  ran  to  him 
with  both  hands  out.  The  Major  looked 
astonished,  but  Father  grinned  and  evi- 
dently explained,  for  soon  he,  too,  was 
shaking  hands  warmly  with  the  long-lost 
Timmons. 

We  finally  managed  to  get  ourselves  and 
our  suit  cases  and  the  Major  and  Timmons 
all  securely  packed  into  the  car  and  started 
up  one  of  the  narrow  streets. 

"This  is  Main  Street,"  the  Major  an- 
nounced, as  we  turned  to  the  right  down  a 
somewhat  wider  thoroughfare  that  had 
no  sidewalks  but  was  well  supplied  with 
electric  lights.  "Thought  you  'd  like  a 
glimpse  of  the  town." 

For  a  few  minutes  we  were  kept  busy 
trying  to  take  in  every  detail  of  the  houses 
and  shops  we  passed  and  still  have  time 


62 


to  glance  at  the  grinning,  brightly  dressed 
colored  men  and  women,  and  the  occasional 
white  man  abroad  at  this  early  hour. 

"The  Post  is  really  in  the  town,"  the 
Major  was  explaining  to  Father,  as  we  left 
the  shopping  district  behind.  "We  often 
let  the  men  come  in  to  the  theater  and  the 
stores.  They  seem  to  get  along  splen- 
didly with  the  people." 

"Oh,  yes,  indeed,  there  's  a  theater, — 
the  Apollo,  in  Coconut  Square.  A  local 
stock  company  has  just  been  organized 
and  seems  to  be  making  a  great  hit." 

"I  believe  there  are  churches  of  almost 
every  denomination.  (This  was  in  reply 
to  a  question  from  Mother.)  The  Roman 
Catholic,  the  Lutheran  and  the  Anglican 
are  the  largest  and  —  But  here  we  are  !" 

Sure  enough,  the  automobile  had  turned 
into  a  narrow  driveway,  between  two 
whitewashed  fences,  where  a  marine  doing 
sentry  duty  would  have  been  sign  enough 
that  we  had  indeed  arrived,  even  if  the  long 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  63 

white  buildings  ahead  could  have  been 
anything  but  barracks. 

The  drive  led  around  the  barracks,  past 
a  big,  well-kept  grass  plot,  and  ended  at 
the  front  (only  it  turned  out  to  be  the 
back)  of  three  houses.  Like  the  Three 
Bears,  one  house  was  big,  one  was  medium- 
sized  and  one  was  little.  But  they  were 
all  white,  with  green  blinds  and  low  green 
roofs,  and  they  all  looked  out  across  a 
flower  garden  to  the  ocean,  which  was  only 
a  few  hundred  feet  away. 

"We  land  you  at  your  back  door," 
apologized  the  Major,  "but  I  can  at  least 
take  you  in  at  the  front."  And  he  led  us 
down  a  flagstone  path  beside  the  biggest 
house  and  across  a  broad,  shady  porch  into 
a  wide  door  that  stood  hospitably  open. 

"What  a  duck  of  a  room!"  Martha 
exclaimed,  as  she  stepped  inside,  and  I  had 
to  agree  with  her  for  once. 

The  living  room  ran  the  whole  length  of 
the  house  and  had  four  big  windows  on  the 


64  SERGEANT   JANE 

ocean  side.  In  the  opposite  wall  was  a 
stone  fireplace,  and  the  comfortable-looking 
wicker  furniture  was  upholstered  in  rose  and 
brown  to  match  the  curiously-patterned 
rug  on  the  floor.  There  were  bowls  of 
flowers  around  the  room  and  a  pile  of 
magazines  on  the  table. 

"How  wonderfully  homelike!"  Mother 
cried  in  delight.  "  Who  did  all  this  for  us  ?  " 

"Every  one  in  the  Post  wanted  to  help 
get  ready  for  the  Colonel  and  his  family," 
the  Major  replied,  evidently  delighted  at 
her  pleasure.  "But  it  was  Mrs.  Hunter 
who  put  on  the  finishing  touches.  It  takes 
a  woman  for  that,  and  she  's  the  only  one 
here  now.  She  and  Captain  Hunter  and 
their  two  youngsters  live  in  that  house  on 
your  right,  and  Captain  Mitchell,  Captain 
Brown  and  I  keep  bachelor  quarters  on  the 
other /side.  Mrs.  Hunter  will  be  mighty 
glad  to  have  another  woman  here.  I  guess 
she 's  been  pretty  lonely  since  our  last 
married  man  pulled  out,  with  that  bunch  of 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  65 

'  duration-of-the-war '  enlistments.  I  know 
you  '11  like  her." 

"I  'm  sure  I  shall,"  Mother  agreed 
heartily.  "I  can  hardly  wait  to  thank  her 
for  this  lovely  welcome." 

"  Oh,  she  '11  be  over  as  soon  as  you  're 
settled  a  bit.  And  now  I  '11  be  running 
along  myself,  to  give  you  a  chance  hi  that 
line.  The  men  will  be  right  up  with  your 
trunks  and  things,  and  Sam  there  in  the 
kitchen  has  some  chow  ready  for  you  if  I  'm 
not  much  mistaken.  Au  revoir,  everybody. 
See  you  later,  Colonel !" 

The  Major  saluted  and  departed,  in  the 
midst  of  a  chorus  of  thanks,  and  with  one 
accord  we  dropped  down  on  the  nearest 
chairs  to  get  our  breath. 

"Is  n't  he  nice?" 

"Is  n't  the  house  adorable?" 

"  Is  n't  Charlotte  Amalie  the  most 
picturesque  — " 

But  before  we  could  even  begin  to  com- 
pare impressions,  the  door  on  the  right  of  the 


66  SERGEANT  JANE 

fireplace  slowly  opened,  and  a  beaming 
black  face  appeared,  shortly  followed  by  a 
long,  thin  figure  in  immaculate  white  ducks. 

"I's  Sam,"  the  apparition  announced. 
"I  has  somethings  for  you  to  eat  if  you 
like." 

"Indeed  we  do  like,  Sam,"  Father  told 
him.  "But  give  us  about  five  minutes 
to  take  off  our  hats  and  coats  and  wash  our 
faces." 

We  went  racing  upstairs  and  discovered 
two  big  bedrooms  and  a  bath  in  the  front 
of  the  house,  and  the  same  in  the  back, 
with  a  storeroom  and  a  little  sewing  room 
in  between  at  the  ends  of  the  hall. 

"Which  ith  whothe?  Which  .  ith 
whothe?"  Jimmy  demanded,  hopping 
from  one  foot  to  the  other  in  his  excite- 
ment. 

"I  guess  Father  and  I  will  take  this  one," 
Mother  decided,  ending  her  tour  of  in- 
spection in  one  of  the  front  rooms  that 
was  papered  in  gray  and  hung  with  blue 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  67 

curtains.  "Martha  can  have  the  pink 
room  next  door ;  Jane  the  yellow  one  in  the 
back  of  the  house,  and  Jimmy  the  room 
with  the  little  brass  bed.  You  can  see  the 
ocean  from  every  room,  so  there  ought  n't 
to  be  any  jealousy." 

"There  won't!"  we  all  shouted. 
"That 's  just  the  one  I  wanted." 

Mother  would  have  been  a  good  delegate 
to  the  Peace  Conference. 

The  breakfast  Sam  served  us  was  so 
delicious  that  we  forgot  all  about  its  being 
the  second  one  we  'd  had  that  morning,  and 
Jimmy  and  I  were  very  much  surprised 
when  we  got  stuck  at  the  tenth  in  a  free-for- 
all  biscuit  race. 

Timmons  dropped  in  just  as  we  had 
finished,  and  so  did  our  trunks,  but  Mother 
let  me  go  for  a  walk  around  the  Post  and 
said  I  could  unpack  later. 

"Them 's  the  barracks,  Sergeant," 
Timmons  commenced,  very  much  pleased 
with  his  role  of  guide.  "Them  tents  down 


68  SERGEANT   JANE 

by  the  water, "  he  pointed  to  two  long  rows 
of  khaki-colored  tents  to  the  left  of  the 
driveway,  "  is  where  the  boys  mostly  sleeps, 
exceptin'  during  the  rainy  season." 

" When  's  that?"  I  asked. 

"Mostly  from  August  to  November, 
they  say.  I  Ve  only  been  here  since  Jan- 
uary, but  I  seen  a  right  smart  bit  of  rain 
falling  early  this  month.  They  say  it 
won't  rain  none  now  till  the  first  of  August. 
That 's  when  it 's  hottest  here,  too,  they 
say  —  the  first  of  August  to  the  end  of 
October.  Hot  and  rainy  both  to  once; 
seems  sort  of  funny,  but  so  they  say.  Any- 
how, that 's  when  the  schools  close,  and 
people  go  up  to  the  hills." 

"Don't  the  schools  close  till  the  first 
of  August?"  I  questioned  surprised. 

"That  they  don't.  And  they  open  the 
first  of  November  —  at  least,  so  they  tell 
me.  But  here  now  is  where  they  show  us 
movin'  pictures  every  night,  except  when 
they  forget  to  send  us  any  down  from  New 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  69 

York.  They  plays  basketball  here,  too, 
and  over  on  the  P'rade  grounds  football 
and  baseball.  Got  regular  leagues,  they 
have,  and  some  of  the  games  are  hot  ones, 
I  tell  you." 

"That 's  great,  Timmons.  May  I  watch 
them?" 

"  Sure,  Mike !  And  we  got  a  couple  of 
tennis  courts.  They  ain't  much  yet,  but 
they  're  shapin'  up.  I  recollected  you  was 
partial  to  that  game,  and  I  've  had  the  boys 
rolling  'em  every  day  here  lately." 

"You're  a  brick!  And  I'll  help  roll 
them.  Do  they  ever  go  swimming?" 

"Not  just  here,  Sergeant  Jane,  there  not 
being  no  beach,  so  to  speak.  But  over  to 
Mosquito  Bay  (he  pointed  rather  vaguely 
down  the  coast)  there  's  a  jim-dandy  beach, 
with  a  dock  and  a  springboard  and  every- 
thing all  complete.  We  run  the  motor 
truck  over  there  nearly  every  afternoon. 
Then  there  's  East  Point  for  surf  bathin', 
and  Magens  over  t'other  side  of  the  island 


70  SERGEANT  JANE 

and  — "  He  suddenly  broke  off  and  with- 
out any  explanation  changed  the  subject. 

"Say,  did  you  happen  to  run  across  that 
black-haired  lieutenant  who  was  down  here 
awhile  back?"  he  inquired. 

"  Lieutenant  Duncan  ?  Uh-huh,  I  surely 
did.  He  came  to  Norfolk  just  before  we  left 
and  gave  me  your  messages,  and  I  was  mighty 
tickled  to  find  out  you  were  down  here." 

"  Well,  now,  was  n't  that  a  quincidence ! 
Did  he  happen  maybe  to  make  mention 
of  a  little  gift  I  was  making  for  you  ?" 

"  Yes,  but  he  would  n't  tell  me  what  it 
was.  Please  tell  me,  Timmons ;  I  'm  crazy 
to  know." 

The  old  man  chuckled  to  himself  and 
slapped  his  leg.  "Crazy,  is  it?"  he  said. 
"Well,  you  '11  have  to  be  crazy  a  bit  longer, 
then.  For  it  ain't  finished,  and  you  ain't 
going  to  see  it  or  hear  tell  of  it  till  it 's 
absotively  through  and  completed." 

I  saw  there  was  no  use  in  teasing  him  and 
accordingly  reconciled  myself  to  a  bit  of 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  71 

watchful  waiting,  although  I  was  fright- 
fully curious.  We  walked  around  a  little 
longer,  and  he  introduced  me  to  a  corporal 
and  a  couple  of  privates  from  his  company. 
Then  he  said  he  had  to  get  back  to  work 
and,  giving  me  a  knowing  wink,  asked 
which  I  liked  best  —  blue  or  green  or  red. 

"Yellow,"  I  answered,  expecting  him  to 
laugh  at  me  for  dodging  the  question. 

But  he  just  repeated,  "Yellow !  Yellow !" 
and  started  away  without  another  word,  v 

I  went  back  to  our  house  and  found  that 
Mrs.  Hunter  had  been  to  call  and  had  made 
a  great  hit. 

"She  's  as  pretty  as  a  picture,"  Martha 
informed  me.  "Dark  and  slender,  with 
big  gray  eyes.  She  comes  from  Virginia 
and  has  an  adorable  Southern  accent  and 
wanted  to  hear  all  about  Norfolk.  She 
has  a  little  girl  seven  and  a  boy  six,  and  they 
are  at  school,  and  we  '11  have  to  begin  going 
right  away,  too,  because  it  isn't  over  — " 

"Till  the  first  of  August,"  I  interrupted, 


72  SERGEANT  JANE 

anxious  to  show  that  she  did  n't  have  a 
corner  on  all  the  news. 

"But  she  says  she  doesn't  know  where 
we  can  go,"  Martha  continued  serenely, 
not  even  stopping  to  ask  how  I  knew  about 
the  first  of  August.  "The  grammar  schools 
of  Charlotte  Amalie  are  only  for  the 
*  Spicks '  (that 's  what  they  call  the  col- 
ored people),  but  there's  a  small  private 
school  that  her  children  go  to,  and  Jimmy 
can  go  there,  and  he  '11  probably  be  in  the 
same  grade  with  Betty-Ellen  (is  n't  that 
a  darling  name  ?)  but  it  only  goes  to  about 
the  sixth  grade,  and  there  are  n't  any  high 
schools  and  — " 

"Heavens,  Martha!  don't  you  ever 
have  to  stop  and  breathe?"  I  interrupted 
again.  It 's  impossible  to  talk  to  Martha 
without  interrupting  her.  "Mother,  where 
are  we  going  to  school?" 

We  were  sitting  on  Mother's  bed,  watch- 
ing her  take  things  out  of  her  trunk  and  put 
them  in  the  big  chest  of  drawers. 


CHARLOTTE  AMALIE  73 

"I  haven't  talked  it  over  with  Father," 
she  told  us,  "but  from  what  Mrs.  Hunter 
says,  the  only  possible  place  for  girls  of 
your  age  is  a  Convent  school  just  outside 
Charlotte  Amalie.  Holy  Cross,  I  think 
it  is  called.  Even  there  the  course  only 
covers  the  eighth  grade,  so  I  don't  know 
what  Martha  will  do.  We  '11  go  over  and 
visit  the  school  to-morrow." 

"But  don't  we  have  to  be  Catholics?" 
I  asked. 

"No;  they  take  scholars  of  any  denomi- 
nation, and  even  some  of  the  better  class 
'yellows.'  Mrs.  Hunter  says  that  the  Sis- 
ters are  very  charming." 

"I  '11  disgrace  myself  for  sure,"  I  pre- 
dicted gloomily.  "I  was  never  hi  this 
world  intended  for  a  Convent  school." 

Mother  laughed  at  my  doleful  expression. 
"We  '11  see  about  that  later,"  she  said. 
"Now  run  along  and  finish  unpacking,  for 
we  are  all  to  go  over  to  the  barracks  mess 
hall  for  dinner." 


CHAPTER  V 

WE  GO  TO  THE  CONVENT  SCHOOL 

EARLY  the  next  morning  Jimmy 
started  off  to  school  with  the 
Hunter  children,  and  Timmons 
drove  Mother  and  Martha  and  me  over  to 
the  Holy  Cross  Convent  on  the  other  side 
-of  the  town. 

It  was  a  low  white  stone  building,  built 
around  a  court,  and  except  for  the  clois- 
tered entrance  and  the  crosses  on  the  roof, 
I  would  never  have  suspected  that  it  was 
a  convent. 

Just  as  we  drew  up,  the  school  bell  started 
to  rin^  and  several  children  ran  shouting 
up  the  path  and  into  a  door  in  the  left  wing 
of  the  building.  We  stared  at  our  future 


WE  GO  TO  THE   CONVENT  SCHOOL     75 

schoolmates  curiously  as  we  followed  them 
slowly  along  the  stone  walk. 

A  very  young  novice,  with  smooth  light 
hair  and  eyes  so  dark  they  were  almost 
black,  showed  us,  when  Mother  had  told 
her  our  errand,  into  a  small,  low-ceilinged 
room  just  inside  the  door. 

"Sister  Thecla  will  be  with  you  soon," 
she  assured  us,  smiling  in  the  friendliest 
way.  "She  is  now  conducting  the  opening 
exercises." 

She  spoke  with  such  a  quaint  little  accent 
that  Mother  asked  if  she  were  not  French. 

"Yes,  Madam,  Alsatian,"  she  replied, 
evidently  much  pleased  at  the  question. 
"My  mother  and  my  father  came  to  this 
island  when  I  was  just  a  baby.  They 
thought  to  make  a  great  fortune  in  a  sugar 
plantation  that  had  been  left  to  them  by 
my  uncle's  will.  But  the  fortune  did  not 
grow  so  fast  as  did  the  family  —  and  now 
there  are  ten  of  us  children  instead  of  a 
great  pile  of  gold.  We  are  all  happy  though 


76  SERGEANT  JANE 

—  oh,  oui  I  Et  maintenant,  I  am  learning, 
I  hope,  to  be  a  good  teacher." 

"Indeed  you  are,  Nicolette,"  a  pleasant 
voice  broke  in,  and  looking  up  we  saw  a  tall, 
gray-haired  nun  standing  in  the  doorway. 
"You  wished  to  see  me,  Madame?"  she 
asked.  "I  am  Sister  Thecla,  the  head  of 
the  school." 

"I  am  Mrs.  Graves,"  Mother  explained. 
"My  husband  has  come  to  take  charge  of 
the  Marine  Base.  These  are  my  two 
daughters,  whom  I  hope  you  will  be  able 
to  take  into  your  school." 

"I  hope  so,  too,"  the  Sister  replied  cor- 
dially, coming  into  the  room  and  taking 
our  hands  in  hers.  She  seemed  to  be  study- 
ing us  for  a  moment  with  her  quiet  blue 
eyes,  and  then  she  sat  down  beside  Mother 
and  began  discussing  our  preparation  and 
the  courses  we  were  to  take. 

I  only  half  listened  to  what  they  were  say- 
ing, for  I  could  hear  Ma'amselle  Nicolette's 
merry  voice  in  an  adjoining  room  and  the 


WE  GO  TO  THE   CONVENT  SCHOOL     77 

murmured  replies  of  her  charges.  I  was 
hoping  that  I  would  be  in  some  of  her 
classes,  when  I  suddenly  realized  that 
Sister  Thecla  was  speaking  to  me. 

"Jane,  will  you  come  with  me,  please," 
she  said,  and  added,  turning  to  Mother : 
"From  what  you  say  she  should  fit  in  per- 
fectly with  our  oldest  class.  For  her  sister 
we  will  see  about  some  special  courses  when 
I  return." 

Mother  gave  me  a  reassuring  smile,  and 
I  followed  the  black-clad  figure  down  the 
corridor  and  into  a  sunny  classroom. 
There  were  perhaps  fifteen  girls  seated  at 
the  small  wooden  desks  and  a  Sister  on  a 
raised  platform  was  reading  aloud  to  them. 

"Sister  Agatha,"  said  my  guide,  "this 
is  a  new  pupil,  Jane  Graves.  She  has  come 
all  the  way  from  Virginia,  and  we  hope  she 
is  going  to  be  happy  here." 

Sister  Agatha  was  pale  and  thin  and 
had  a  receding  chin.  She  screwed  her 
thin-lipped  mouth  into  something  that 


78  SERGEANT  JANE 

was  evidently  intended  for  a  smile  and 
waved  her  hand  at  me. 

"There  is  a  vacant  desk  next  to  Made- 
lon*s.  Sit  down,  my  dear,'*  she  ordered, 
in  a  cold,  expressionless  voice.  "We  are 
now  having  our  English  period." 

Sister  Thecla  had  deserted  me,  and  fif- 
teen pairs  of  eyes  were  studying  me 
curiously,  so  I  slipped  as  quickly  as  possible 
into  the  only  empty  seat  in  the  room. 

Madelon  proved  to  be  a  pretty,  black- 
eyed,  curly-headed  girl  of  about  my  own 
age,  who  smiled  at  me  encouragingly. 
She  looked  so  much  like  Nicolette  that  I 
started  to  ask  if  they  were  n't  sisters,  but 
as  she  saw  me  open  my  mouth  she  put  a 
warning  finger  to  her  lips,  winked  violently, 
on  the  side  farthest  from  Sister  Agatha, 
and  lengthened  her  rosy  face  into  a  chin- 
less,  tight-lipped  grimace  there  was  no 
mistaking.  The  next  instant  she  was  plac- 
idly studying  her  book,  with  the  primmest 
of  countenances. 


WE  GO  TO  THE   CONVENT  SCHOOL     79 

I  was  so  surprised  that  I  giggled  loudly, 
but  fortunately  Sister  Agatha  had  begun 
to  read  again,  in  a  harsh,  resounding 
voice  that  quite  drowned  out  all  other 
sounds. 

"Aggie  's  a  cold-blooded  old  female,  but 
the  rest  of  them  are  wonderful." 

I  jumped  nervously  at  this  startling 
announcement  and  looked  around  to  see 
who  had  spoken.  I  was  at  the  back  of 
the  last  row,  and  the  girl  in  front  of  me 
was  busily  drawing  pictures  on  a  pad  con- 
cealed behind  her  book  of  poems.  Madelon 
was  still  bending  over  her  lessons,  the  pic- 
ture of  studious  attention. 

"We  have  French  from  Nicole tte  and 
Spanish  from  Sister  Dolorosa.  Sister 
Thecla  herself  teaches  us  history,  but  Aggie 
has  us  for  everything  else." 

This  time  I  saw  Madelon's  lips  moving, 
though  her  expression  never  changed.  I 
grinned  my  admiration  of  the  scheme,  but 
hesitated  to  try  it  myself. 


80  SERGEANT  JANE 

Then  Madelon  raised  her  hand.  "Sister 
Agatha,"  she  asked  sweetly,  when  the  flow 
of  poetry  had  stopped  for  a  moment. 
"May  Jane  Graves  look  on  with  me  until 
she  gets  a  book?" 

"Certainly,  Madelon,  my  dear,"  was  the 
gracious  reply.  "  That  is  an  excellent  idea." 

Safe  behind  the  "Golden  Treasury"  I 
learned  many  things  from  the  diplomatic 
Madelon.  She  was  indeed  Nicolette's  sis- 
ter, and  there  were  two  boys  and  another 
girl  between  them,  and  five  smaller  sisters 
and  brothers.  The  two  oldest  boys  helped 
their  father  on  the  plantation,  but  all  the 
rest  of  the  children,  except  the  very  young- 
est baby,  were  in  the  Convent  School. 
That  was  Therese,  who  was  sixteen,  over 
in  the  corner;  she  herself  was  fourteen, 
but  small  for  her  age.  The  school  was 
tres  bien  and  all  the  Sisters  angels,  with  the 
single  exception  of  Sister  Agatha,  who  was 
apt  to  be  strict. 

"But  she  seems  to  like  you,"  I  remarked, 


WE  GO  TO  THE  CONVENT  SCHOOL     81 

trying  to  imitate  her  way  of  talking  without 
changing  the  expression  of  her  face. 

"She  adores  me,"  was  the  modest  reply. 
"She  thinks  I  am  her  most  bright  and  most 
lovely  pupil.  Some  day,  I  fear,  she  will  find 
me  out.  Eh  bien  !  Eet  is  fine  while  eet 
lasts." 

Just  then  Sister  Agatha  made  a  sweeping 
gesture  to  indicate  the  parting  flight  of 
Shelley's  skylark  and  turned  ominously  to 
the  class. 

"  Why  is  this  a  beautiful  poem  ?  "  she  de- 
manded of  the  room  at  large,  and  then,  re- 
ceiving no  reply,  focused  on  a  single  victim. 

"Anna  Larkin,  why  is  this  a  beautiful 
poem?" 

A  fat,  blonde  girl  stood  up  reluctantly 
and  shuffled  nervously  from  one  foot  to  the 
other. 

"Why-y-"  she  began  at  last,  and  a  groan 
went  up  from  the  entire  class.  They  evi- 
dently knew  what  was  going  to  happen. 

"How  many  thousands  of  times  do  I 


82  SERGEANT  JANE 

have  to  request  that  you  shall  not  begin 
a  sentence  with  'why'?"  Sister  Agatha 
raged.  "Answer  my  question  and  answer 
it  promptly." 

But  poor  Anna  could  only  blush  and 
stutter,  and  finally  she  burst  into  tears  and 
collapsed  into  her  seat. 

Three  other  efforts  to  explain  Shelley's 
poetical  genius  (a  thing  which  he  himself 
might  have  found  a  bit  difficult  to  do) 
failed  to  meet  with  Sister  Agatha's  approval. 
Then  Madelon  raised  her  hand,  with  just 
the  proper  amount  of  hesitation. 

"You  may  recite,  Madelon,"  said  our 
teacher,  going  through  the  contortions  that, 
for  her,  registered  smiling  approval. 

Madelon  rose  to  her  feet  and  tossed  back 
her  curls. 

"'The  Skylark,'  is  a  beautiful  poem," 
she  announced  with  great  feeling.  "Eet  is 
beautiful  because  of  the  beautiful  thoughts 
eet  contains  and  because  of  the  beautiful 
way  in  which  those  thoughts  are  expressed." 


WE   GO   TO  THE   CONVENT   SCHOOL     83 

"Beautiful,"  murmured  Sister  Agatha 
contentedly. 

Madelon  gave  me  a  tremendoils  wink. 
It  was  the  simplest  kind  of  bluffing,  and 
one  with  which  I  had  had  some  experience 
myself. 

"Why  does  this  poem  inspire  us  with 
awe?"  was  the  next  question. 

I  waited  until  four  trembling  students 
had  tackled  this  poser  and  gone  down  to 
ignominious  defeat.  Then  I  raised  my  hand 
rather  slowly. 

Sister  Agatha  did  not  smile  at  me,  but 
she  did  say,  quite  pleasantly:  "Ah,  our 
new  pupil  is  going  to  answer  the  question 
for  us." 

Thus  encouraged  I  stood  up.  The  room 
looked  surprisingly  large  and  full  of  people, 
and  Sister  Agatha  seemed  to  be  growing 
taller  and  more  forbidding  every  second. 
I  gulped  once  or  twice  and  made  a  bold 
start. 

"We  all  find  that  'The  Skylark'  fills  us 


84  SERGEANT  JANE 

with  awe,"  I  proclaimed  loftily,  "because 
of  —  because  of — "  My  mind  had  sud- 
denly become  absolutely  blank,  but  I 
realized  that  if  I  did  n't  say  something  I 
would  be  ruined  forever,  so  I  gulped  again 
and  finished  my  sentence  all  in  one  breath  — 
"because  of  the  awful  thoughts  it  contains 
and  the  awful  way  in  which  those  thoughts 
are  expressed." 

I  knew  it  did  n't  sound  just  right  as  soon 
as  I  had  it  out,  but  I  was  n't  prepared  for 
the  sickening  silence  that  greeted  me. 
The  whole  class  seemed  to  be  holding  its 
breath,  and  Sister  Agatha's  face  was  like 
a  thundercloud. 

"You  Ve  done  it  now,  Jean  Graves," 
Madelon  whispered  consolingly,  as  I  sank 
terror-stricken  into  my  seat.  "She  thinks 
it 's  perfectly  awful  for  any  one  to  say 
'awful.'" 

"So  you  choose  to  make  fun  of  us,  Miss 
Jane  Graves — "  just  as  the  storm  began, 
the  door  of  the  schoolroom  opened,  and  in 


WE  GO  TO  THE   CONVENT  SCHOOL     85 

walked  Sister  Thecla,  Mother  and  Martha ; 
and  in  the  introductions  that  followed, 
Sister  Agatha  forgot  me  for  the  time  being. 
Before  she  had  a  chance  to  think  of  my 
"awful"  recitation  again,  the  bell  rang,  and 
we  all  went  into  another  room  to  read 
French  with  Ma'amselle  Nicolette. 

Walking  home  together  at  noon,  Martha 
and  I  decided  that  we  were  going  to  like  the 
school  immensely. 

"Only  I  know  I'll  never  get  along  with 
Sister  Agatha,"  I  added.  "I  got  in  wrong 
with  her  first  thing  with  that  old  *  Sky- 
lark/" 

When  I  told  Martha  about  it,  she  seemed 
to  think  that  it  was  a  great  joke,  but  I 
noticed  that  she  kept  rejoicing  because  she 
did  n't  have  anything  except  sewing  with 
Sister  Agatha. 

"Is  n't  Ma'amselle  Nicolette  darling?" 
she  asked,  as  we  stopped  to  look  into  some 
of  the  shop  windows  on  Main  Street. 
"I  am  to  take  a  special  French  conversa- 


86  SERGEANT  JANE 

tion  course  from  her  and  a  Spanish  one 
from  Sister  Thecla." 

"  I  '11  say  you  're  lucky,"  I  sighed  enviously. 
"And  you  only  have  to  go  in  the  mornings. 
Gee,  I  wish  I  were  three  years  older !  " 

"You  'd  better  not  let  Mother  hear  you 
saying  *  Gee  ! ' '  Martha  admonished  me 
sternly.  "You  know  she  —  Oh,  look  at 
that  queer  kind  of  chocolate  candy !  Let 's 
get  some." 

I  had  no  objections,  so  we  went  into  the 
shop,  which  seemed  to  be  a  sort  of  grocery 
store  and  candy  stand  combined. 

"  What 's  inside  of  them  ?  "  Martha  asked, 
pointing  to  the  round,  chocolate-covered 
candies  we  had  seen  through  the  window. 

"Deeferent  flavors,  Mees,"  answered  the 
nice-looking  colored  boy  who  came  forward 
to  wait  on  us.  "Vanil,  Feeg,  Coc'nut, 
Lemon,  Orange,  Jelly " 

"All  right,  all  right !"  Martha  was  will- 
ing to  take  the  rest  for  granted.  "What 
are  the  ones  in  this  pile  ?  " 


WE   GO   TO  THE   CONVENT   SCHOOL     87 

He  looked  puzzled  for  a  second  and  then 
quickly  turned  his  back  to  us,  murmuring, 
"Just  a  meenut,  Mees." 

"Feeg,"  he  announced  triumphantly, 
swinging  around  again  and  showing  his 
shiny  white  teeth  in  a  broad  grin. 

"Give  us  some  of  those,"  said  Martha, 
"and  some  of  the  flatter  ones.  What  are 
they?" 

Once  more  he  faced  about  for  a  moment 
and  turned  back  to  announce  with  the  po- 
litest of  bows,  "  Vanil,  Mees  !  Him,  Vanil." 

Martha  suddenly  gave  a  loud  snort  and 
dashed  out  of  the  shop.  I  could  n't  imagine 
what  had  happened,  but  I  paid  the  boy, 
took  the  candy  and  followed  her.  She 
was  leaning  limply  against  a  fence  when 
I  caught  up  with  her,  and  she  started  gig- 
gling again  as  soon  as  she  saw  me. 

"What  ever  struck  you,  you  poor  nut?" 
I  demanded. 

"Oh,  Jane,  did  n't  you  see  what  he  was 
doing?"  she  gasped. 


88  SERGEANT  JANE 

"No;  what?" 

"He  turned  his  back  and  bit  the  candy 
to  find  out  what  kind  it  was,  and  then  he 
was  so  killingly  polite  and  pleased  with 
himself  when  he  told  us.  Oh,  dear,  do  you 
suppose  they  do  all  their  business  that 
way  in  Charlotte  Amalie?" 

"Do  you  suppose  he  gave  us  the  bitten 
ones?"  I  giggled. 


CHAPTER  VI 

WHITES  AND  GREENS 

THE  Holy  Cross  school  turned  out 
to  be  all  that  we  had  hoped  from 
our   impressions   of  the   first   day. 
Madelon  and  I  came  to  be  great  friends, 
and  her  influence  with  Sister  Agatha  kept  me 
from  utter  disgrace,  although  I  was  always 
getting  into  scrapes  in  that  worthy  lady's 
classroom. 

The  other  girls,  except  for  the  few 
"Spicks"  who  kept  entirely  to  themselves, 
were  mostly  of  English  or  Danish  descent, 
and  they  all  talked  English,  although  I 
found  they  didn't  know  a  bit  of  American. 
I  taught  Madelon  a  lot  of  slang,  and  she 
tried  to  return  the  compliment  with  some 
French  expressions,  which  sounded  great 


90  SERGEANT  JANE 

when  she  said  them  but  would  n't  twist 
around  my  tongue.  She  spoke  English 
perfectly,  except  that  she  could  n't  learn 
to  pronounce  "it"  anyway  except  "eet", 
and  it  did  sound  so  funny  to  hear  her  say 
"cut  eet  out"  and  "can  you  beat  eet." 

As  a  whole  the  school  was  dreadfully 
ladylike  and  never  seemed  to  get  mussed 
up  or  dirty.  After  about  a  week  of  walks 
and  sewing  bees  at  recess  times,  I  grew 
desperate. 

"  Madelon,  I  'm  going  to  start  a  basket- 
ball team,"  I  whispered  during  a  geography 
lesson  and  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing 
her  lose  her  expression  of  unwavering  at- 
tention for  a  minute. 

"What 's  that?"  she  asked. 

"I  '11  tell  you  all  about  it  at  recess,"  I 
promised  and  set  to  work  planning  athletic 
careers  for  all  the  girls  in  the  class.  It 
was  a  real  service  to  humanity,  but  Sister 
Agatha  rudely  interrupted  it  by  asking 
me  to  name  the  zones. 


WHITES  AND  GREENS  91 

"Forward,  guard — "  I  began  absent- 
mindedly. 

"What?" 

"Temp'rate,  torr'd  — "  I  hastily 
amended,  and  she  had  to  admit  I  really 
knew  them. 

When  recess  came  I  explained  about 
basketball  to  Madelon  and  Mary  Deane 
and  two  or  three  others  I  thought  had 
shown  some  signs  of  unreleased  "pep." 
They  all  thought  it  would  be  great  fun  to 
get  up  a  team.  Mary  Deane  said  that  her 
cousins  in  England  played  all  sorts  of 
games  at  school,  and  she  had  always  wanted 
to. 

I  promised  to  ask  for  one  of  the  old 
balls  from  the  Post  and  said  I  thought 
Father  would  let  some  of  the  men  help 
us  fix  up  baskets  in  the  field  back  of  the 
school. 

"Won't  we  have  to  ask  Sister  Thecla's 
permission?"  little  Christine  Dann  sug- 
gested timidly. 


92  SERGEANT  JANE 

"You  ask  her,  Jane,'*  they  all  chorused 
at  once  and  began  dragging  me  toward  the 
office. 

"  Oh,  I  can't !  I  don't  know  what  to 
say,"  I  protested.  "Mary  Deane,  you  do 
it." 

"What  is  Mary  Deane  to  do?"  asked  a 
quiet  voice,  as  Sister  Thecla,  hearing  us, 
came  smiling  to  the  doorway. 

She  looked  so  pleasant  and  unforbidding 
that  it  was  n't  at  all  hard  to  explain  to  her 
about  basketball  at  recess  and  after  school, 
and  teams,  and  bloomers,  and  what  fun  it 
would  be  and  good  exercise  too.  At  first 
she  did  n't  quite  understand,  but  when  I 
had  repeated  it  all  slowly,  and  Mary  Deane 
had  told  about  her  English  cousins,  and  all 
the  other  girls  had  said  how  much  they 
wanted  to  play,  she  nodded  her  head 
thoughtfully. 

"I  see  no  reason  why  you  shouldn't 
play  this  game,  if  your  parents  are  willing," 
she  decided.  "  It  won't  interfere  with  your 


WHITES  AND   GREENS  93 

studies,  and  it  is  never  well  to  develop  our 
minds  at  the  expense  of  our  bodies.  Can 
you  teach  the  other  girls,  Jane?" 

"I  can  try,"  I  assured  her.  "And 
Martha  will  help,  I  know." 

"Then  you  have  my  permission,"  she 
smiled.  "I  shall  be  anxious  to  see  you 
begin." 

So  that  very  afternoon  Timmons  and 
two  men  from  his  company  came  over  to 
help,  and  with  poles  and  boards  and  fish 
netting  and  wire  we  rigged  up  a  couple  of 
unmistakable  baskets.  Then  we  white- 
washed lines  on  the  field  and  rolled  out 
some  of  the  worst  bumps.  When  it  was 
finished  it  looked  so  inviting  that  Martha 
and  I  could  hardly  wait  to  begin  and 
stayed  there  until  it  grew  dark,  throwing 
fouls  and  practising  guarding  each  other. 

By  Wednesday  the  girls  all  obtained 
permission  from  their  parents  to  play. 
Martha  and  I  laughed  together  at  the 
thought  of  going  through  such  a  formality 


94  SERGEANT  JANE 

back  in  the  States,  but  from  the  struggles 
some  of  the  girls  reported  having  with  their 
fathers,  the  St.  Thomians  evidently  thought 
basketball  was  an  especially  dangerous 
combination  of  bull-fighting  and  rough- 
and-tumble  football,  such  as  they  were 
accustomed  to  seeing  on  the  parade  ground. 

Of  course  I  forgot  the  ball  and  had  to 
tear  back  to  the  barracks  for  it  while  the 
others  were  dressing.  We  had  tried  to 
explain  about  middies  and  bloomers  and 
had  even  brought  ours  up  to  show  them, 
but  we  were  n't  sure  how  successful  our 
efforts  had  been. 

Madelon  was  waiting  at  the  gate  for  me 
when  I  came  panting  up  with  the  ball. 
"Oh,  Jean  Graves,  depeches-toi,  beat  eet," 
she  cried,  grabbing  my  arm  and  dragging 
me  after  her  down  the  path.  "Come 
on  in  and  look  out  of  the  window." 

"What's  the  hurry?"  I  gasped.  "I'm 
out  of  breath  already." 

"Take  a  look,"  she  commanded,  stop- 


WHITES  AND  GREENS  95 

ping  at  last  in  front  of  one  of  the  back 
windows. 

I  took  several.  The  future  basketball 
stars  of  Holy  Cross  were  standing  or  sitting 
around  the  field  in  various  awkward  and 
uncomfortable  attitudes.  Their  costumes 
would  have  put  a  musical  comedy  chorus 
to  disgrace.  No  two  had  bloomers  of  the 
same  shape,  size  or  color;  some  hung  full 
and  baggy  to  their  ankles,  others  were  skin 
tight  and  decidedly  above  the  knees,  and  they 
were  made  of  every  possible  material  from 
velours  to  organdie.  The  top  pieces  varied 
from  gay  pink  and  blue  sweaters  to  dainty 
lace  shirtwaists. 

"Oh,  Madelon,"  I  giggled.  "Did  you 
ever  see  anything  so  funny  in  your  life?" 

"Never,"  she  confessed.  "How  about 
Anna  Larkin?" 

I  hadn't  particularly  noticed  the  fat 
girl,  but  now  I  saw  that  she  was  dressed 
in  a  purple  and  white  striped  shirt,  that 
must  once  have  been  her  father's,  and  tight 


96  SERGEANT   JANE 

black  silk  trousers  gathered  into  little 
ruffles  at  the  ankles.  She  was  standing 
solemnly  in  the  middle  of  the  field,  with 
her  hands  crossed  behind  her,  waiting  for 
instructions. 

"I  can't  laugh  any  more.  I'm  weak," 
I  spluttered  a  few  minutes  later.  "H-how 
does  Martha  do  it?" 

For  my  self-possessed  sister  had  gathered 
the  would-be  players  around  her  and  was 
lecturing  them,  evidently  about  the  rules 
of  the  game,  while  the  black-gowned  Sisters 
on  the  side  lines  watched  her  admiringly. 

Madelon  and  I  started  out  several  times, 
after  I  had  finally  dressed,  and  were  over- 
come by  fresh  fits  of  laughter  at  the  sight 
of  some  new  freak  of  costume,  before  we 
reached  the  field.  But  I  finally  managed 
to  keep  my  face  straight  long  enough  to 
hand  over  the  ball  and  help  choose  sides. 

And  the  end  of  the  afternoon  we  knew 
that  basketball  had  come  to  Holy  Cross 
to  stay.  Not  that  any  of  the  girls  showed 


WHITES  AND   GREENS  97 

striking  aptitude  for  the  game.  In  fact, 
with  the  single  exception  of  Mary  Deane, 
they  were  hopelessly  awkward. 

"Catch  that  ball,"  Martha  would  shriek 
to  the  bewildered  center  on  her  side,  who 
would  let  it  slip  gently  through  her  hands, 
then  stand  staring  at  it. 

"Pass  it  over  to  me,"  I  would  beg  in  turn, 
only  to  have  my  partner  at  forward  hang 
on  to  the  ball  with  a  death-like  grip  until 
I  was  forced  to  call  time  on  her. 

Anna  Larkin  puffed  and  panted  around 
the  field  until  her  face  was  almost  as  purple 
as  her  shirt,  and  Madelon  fell  down  every 
two  minutes  and  always  threw  the  ball 
in  the  wrong  direction. 

But  they  all  had  a  perfectly  gorgeous 
time.  They  had  never  known  anything 
like  it,  and  they  wanted  to  know  more  im- 
mediately and  to  keep  on  playing  forever. 
I  was  sort  of  afraid  Sister  Thecla  might 
think  the  game  too  unladylike  for  her 
charges,  and  I  knew  by  the  sour  expression 


98  SERGEANT   JANE 

on  Sister  Agatha's  face  that  she  condemned 
it  utterly. 

However,  when  we  finally  persuaded  the 
girls  they  had  had  enough  for  the  first  day, 
Sister  Thecla  called  us  all  together  and  told 
us  that  she  only  wished  she  were  young 
enough  to  play  herself,  but  as  long  as  she 
could  n't  she  would  just  say  good  luck  and 
go  to  it.  (She  did  n't  say  it  in  exactly 
those  words,  of  course,  but  that  was  what 
she  meant.) 

So  we  chose  two  permanent  teams,  the 
Whites  and  the  Greens,  with  Martha  and 
me,  as  the  only  ones  who  really  knew  how  to 
play,  for  the  captains.  And  then,  I  sup- 
pose, each  girl  went  home  and  told  her 
family  what  a  fine  game  basketball  was  and 
how  easily  she  had  learned  it  and  what  a 
good  player  she  was  going  to  be. 

"I  only  wish,"  Martha  sighed,  as  we  were 
getting  ready  for  bed  that  night,  "I  only 
wish  I  had  had  my  camera.  They  '11  never 
look  so  funny  again  because  a  lot  of  them 


WHITES  AND  GREENS  99 

will  have  regular  bloomers  to-morrow. 
Mary  Deane  discovered  that  her  father 
had  a  dozen  pairs  stuck  away  somewhere 
in  his  store.  An  agent  sent  them  to  him 
once,  with  some  other  girls'  clothes,  and  he 
never  expected  to  sell  them." 

"That's  a  shame,"  I  agreed.  "But 
maybe  there  won't  be  a  pair  big  enough  to 
fit  Anna  Larkin,  and  she  's  as  funny  as  all 
the  rest  put  together." 


CHAPTER  VII 

I  AM  GIVEN  A  PRESENT   AND   INTRODUCED 
TO  AN  OLD  FRIEND 

WE  had  been  at  St.  Thomas  over 
a  month,  and  I  was  walking 
home  from  school  one  afternoon, 
when  I  heard  some  one  calling  me.  There 
was  a  big  wharf  in  the  curve  of  land  just 
before  you  turned  in  to  the  barrack  drive- 
way, which  the  men  used  for  the  marine 
launch  and  their  own  boats.  Timmons 
was  standing  near  the  boathouses  and 
waving  to  me  frantically,  so  I  went  down 
to  investigate. 

He  hailed  me  at  the  top  of  his  lungs. 
"  She  's  done,  Sergeant !  She  's  done ! " 

"Who  's  done  ?  "  I  shouted  back. 

"C'mon  'nd  see."     He  grinned,  winked 


I  AM   GIVEN  A  PRESENT  101 

mysteriously  and  pointed  to  one  of  the 
boathouses.  "She  's  in  there,"  he  finally 
informed  me. 

"Who,  Timmons?    Stop  teasing." 

"C'mon  'nd  see,"  he  repeated  and  led 
the  way,  chuckling  to  himself.  "Guess 
you  thought  you  never  was  going  to  get 
that  there  present.  I  cud  only  work  on 
'er  off  'n  on.  But  she  's  done  now,  yessir, 
and  mighty  pretty  too,  if  I  do  say  it  my- 
self, as  made  her." 

He  stopped  in  front  of  the  last  and 
smallest  of  the  boathouses.  "Hurry  up 
and  show  me,"  I  begged,  trying  in  vain  to 
turn  the  door-knob. 

Slowly  and  with  a  great  air  of  ceremony, 
Timmons  drew  a  key  out  of  his  pocket  and 
turned  it  in  the  lock.  Then  he  threw 
open  the  door,  stepped  back  to  let  me  pass, 
and  announced  triumphantly:  "There  she 
be!" 

On  the  floor  of  the  boathouse  lay  a 
canoe.  It  was  a  brand-new  canoe,  painted 


102  SERGEANT   JANE 

a  lovely  shade  of  yellow,  varnished  to 
within  an  inch  of  its  life  and  completely 
fitted  out  with  back  rests,  paddles  and 
even  cushions. 

"Timmons!"  I  gasped.  "Did  you 
really  make  that?  And  is  it  really  for 
me?" 

"Yes  ma'am  to  both  of  those,  Sergeant," 
he  answered  proudly,  wrinkling  his 
weather-beaten  face  into  a  thousand 
creases  as  he  grinned. 

"You're  an  angel  from  heaven!"  I 
cried.  "Oh,  I  'm  so  happy  I  could  die 
in  a  fit!" 

But  I  did  n't.  Instead  I  hugged 
Timmons  until  he  was  red  in  the  face, 
and  then  the  two  of  us  sat  down  on  the 
floor  and  talked  her  over.  She  was  so 
obviously  a  "her"  that,  after  the  first 
look,  I  did  n't  dream  of  hurting  Timmons's 
feelings  by  saying  "it." 

I  admired  every  inch  of  her  inside  and 
out,  and  Timmons  told  me  how  each  part 


I  AM  GIVEN  A  PRESENT  103 

had  been  made.  He  had  been  a  boat 
builder  before  he  joined  the  marines,  he 
explained,  and  had  n't  entirely  forgotten 
his  trade. 

"I'd  say  you  hadn't  forgotten  it  at 
all,"  I  disagreed.  "I  never  saw  anything 
so  perfectly  scrumptious  to  look  at  in  all 
my  life." 

"She  ain't  just  looks,"  he  assured  me. 
"She  goes  like  a  bird.  I  tried  her  out 
one  night  before  I  put  on  the  paint." 

"Let's  try  her  this  minute.  Come 
along,  we  '11  see  what  you  can  do,  Miss 
Why,  Timmons,  what 's  her  name  ? " 

"  I  thought  I  'd  leave  that  for  you  to 
pick,  Sergeant  Jane.  She 's  yours,  and 
it 's  for  you  to  name  her.  You  choose  it, 
and  I  '11  paint  it  on." 

I  climbed  into  the  canoe  and,  sitting 
down  on  one  of  the  seats,  pondered  deeply. 

"You  might  name  her  Virginia,  after  the 
Virgin  Islands,"  Timmons  suggested  with 
a  grin. 


104  SERGEANT   JANE 

"Or  Tommy,  after  St.  Thomas;  or 
Charlotte,  after  Charlotte  Amalie,"  I 
imitated.  "Oh,  Timmons,  I  have  it! 
We'll  call  her  The  Sweetheart  of  the 
West  Indies.  Does  n't  that  sound  great?" 

"Well,  it  might,"  he  admitted  cau- 
tiously. "But  it's  a  bit  long  to  paint  on, 
not  to  mention  saying." 

"You  can  make  small  letters,"  I  pleaded. 
"And  we  can  call  her  Sweetheart  for 
short.  Please,  Timmons,  I  think  it 's  a 
peachy  name." 

So  the  Sweetheart  was  duly  christened 
and  started  out  on  her  first  voyage  with 
her  name  in  neat  black  letters  around  her 
bow. 

I  had  only  paddled  once  or  twice  before, 
but  Timmons  was  a  good  teacher,  and  the 
canoe  responded  so  readily  to  the  slightest 
stroke  that  we  went  sailing  down  the  bay 
in  great  style.  At  one  of  the  wharves  we 
stopped  and  changed  places,  so  that  I 
could  learn  to  paddle  stern.  The  steve- 


I  AM  GIVEN  A  PRESENT  105 

dores  and  coal  carriers,  who  were  always 
hanging  around  the  docks,  stared  after  us 
with  then*  mouths  wide  open  and  their 
eyes  shining  with  mingled  envy  and 
curiosity. 

We  went  along  beautifully  for  a  few 
strokes,  and  I  was  feeling  very  proud  of 
my  steering,  when  the  canoe  turned 
sharply  to  the  left.  I  backed  water  as 
Timmons  directed,  only  to  swing  so  far 
to  the  right  that  we  were  headed  straight 
out  from  shore.  And  we  kept  on  zig- 
zagging back  and  forth  in  spite  of  all  my 
efforts  to  follow  a  straight  line. 

"What  ever  is  the  matter,  Timmons?"  I 
asked  in  surprise.  "It  looked  easy  enough 
when  you  were  doing  it." 

He  carefully  explained  the  two  steering 
strokes  to  me  again  and  made  me  practice 
first  one  and  then  the  other,  until  I  could 
turn  the  Sweetheart  in  a  second. 

"  Now  you  Ve  got  to  allow  for  current 
and  for  your  partn'r  up  front  paddling 


106  ,        SERGEANT  JANE 

stronger  or  else  weaker  than  you,  and 
change  your  stroke  according"  he  in- 
structed me.  "But  you  want  to  do  your 
steering  right  in  with  your  regular  stroke 
and  not  get  out  of  time  with  the  other 
fellow." 

I  went  at  it  again  and  this  time  was  lots 
more  successful,  although  our  course  was 
still  rather  jerky,  and  often  Timmons  had 
to  stop  paddling  until  I  got  myself 
straightened  out. 

"I  am  getting  it,  don't  you  think?"  I 
asked  anxiously,  when  we  were  back 
opposite  our  point  again. 

"Sure,  you  're  getting  it  fine.  Suppose 
I  stop  paddlin'  and  see  how  she  goe§," 
He  chuckled  as  he  said  it,  so  I  was  n't 
surprised  to  discover  that  the  only  way  I 
could  move  along  without  his  help  was 
by  tacking  from  side  to  side,  and  even 
then  we  seemed  fairly  to  crawl. 

"Pretty  good,  for  the  first  lesson,"  com- 
plimented Timmons,  to  my  surprise,  as  he 


I   AM   GIVEN  A  PRESENT  107 

picked  up  his  own  paddle  again  and  headed 
for  the  landing.  "Some  day  you  '11  be 
handlin'  her  all  by  yourself;  but  don't 
try  it  unless  there  's  some  one  around  to 
pick  you  up."  And  once  more  he  chuckled 
to  himself. 

I  soon  realized  the  reason  for  that 
chuckle,  for  after  about  a  week  of  practice, 
he  let  me  take  her  out  alone,  following  me, 
however,  in  one  of  the  rowboats.  The 
Sweetheart  felt  so  light  with  no  one  else 
in  her  and  slid  along  the  top  of  the  water 
so  swiftly,  her  bow  a  good  three  inches  in 
the  air,  that  I  felt  as  though  I  were  flying. 

"This  is  too  easy,"  I  thought  to  myself, 
looking  back  pityingly  at  poor  Timmons 
struggling  with  his  heavy  oars  several 
boat-lengths  behind  me. 

Then  something  went  wrong.  A  sudden 
breeze  or  a  current  caught  the  bow  and 
whirled  it  around.  I  succeeded  in  bring- 
ing it  straight  again,  only  to  have  it  turn 
in  the  other  direction.  This  zigzagging  I 


108  SERGEANT  JANE 

knew  of  old,  and  it  was  bad  enough,  but 
suddenly  the  boat  began  to  go  around  in 
circles.  The  more  I  paddled,  the  more 
persistently  she  spun  around,  first  in  one 
direction  and  then  in  another.  The  Sweet- 
heart gave  a  very  good  imitation  of  a 
merry-go-round;  too  good,  for  by  the 
time  Timmons  came  to  my  rescue  and 
towed  me  home  in  back  of  his  clumsy  old 
rowboat,  I  was  actually  dizzy. 

"Oh,  dear,"  I  wailed,  greatly  dis- 
couraged, "I  '11  never  learn  !" 

"  Sure  you  will.  I  '11  make  you  a  double 
paddle  and  show  you  the  only  fit  and 
decent  way  for  one  person  to  manage 
one  of  these  -  skittish  contraptions,"  Tim- 
mons promised. 

We  put  up  the  rowboat  and  went  out 
again  for  a  long  paddle  up  to  the  inlet. 
It  was  almost  dark  when  we  got  back  to 
the  wharf,  but  several  of  the  men  were 
sitting  on  the  edge,  smoking  and  talking 
and  dangling  their  feet. 


I   AM   GIVEN  A  PRESENT 


"We  '11  put  'er  up  for  you,  Sergeant," 
one  of  them  offered,  giving  the  Sweetheart 
an  admiring  stare,  and  Timmons  let  him 
help  carry  her  in.  But  I  had  to  see  for 
myself  that  she  was  safely  stowed  away 
for  the  night,  so  I  followed  them  to  the 
boathouse,  with  the  rest  of  the  men  trailing 
along  behind.  There  were  two  of  them  I 
did  n't  recognize,  so  I  asked  Timmons 
their  names.  He  turned  to  the  taller  of 
the  two.  "Sergeant  Jane,"  he  began  with 
great  formality,  "I  wants  you  to  meet  —  " 

"Why,  it's  Billy  Murdock,"  I  cried  in 
surprise,  holding  out  my  hand  to  him. 

He  blushed  hotly,  stammered  a  few 
words  and  gave  me  a  limp  handshake. 

"Don't  you  remember  me,  Billy?"  I 
asked,  much  puzzled,  for  he  had  been  in  my 
own  Company  D  at  Norfolk,  and  we  had 
been  good  friends. 

"Sure,  sure,"  he  protested  nervously. 
"Awful  glad  to  see  you  again.  How  are 
you  ?  H  —  how  are  you  ?" 


110  SERGEANT  JANE 


.. 


'I'm  fine,"  I  assured  him.  "Why 
have  n't  you  been  to  see  us?  We  Ve  been 
here  over  a  month." 

"I  — I  — I  — didn't  know,"  he  stut- 
tered, getting  more  and  more  embarrassed. 
"I  —  I  guess  I  did  n't  see  you." 

"But  you  must  have  known  Father  was 
in  command  of  the  Post,  and  that  he  is 
always  anxious  to  see  any  of  the  men  from 
Company  D." 

"Sure,  sure,"  he  muttered  again.  "Of 
course.  I  was  coming.  Just  had  n't  got 
'round  to  it.  Gotta  go  back  to  the  bar- 
racks now.  See  you  again."  And  with 
that  he  disappeared. 

I  stood  staring  after  him,  with  my  mouth 
wide  open. 

"What's  the  matter?"  asked  Timmons, 
who  had  been  making  things  shipshape  in 
the  boathouse.  "Don't  mind  that  Mur- 
dock  fellow ;  he  's  a  queer  one." 

"He  never  used  to  be  queer,"  I  objected. 
"Up  at  Norfolk  he  was  the  jolliest,  liveliest 


I  AM  GIVEN  A  PRESENT  111 

boy  in  the  company.  All  the  men  were 
crazy  about  him." 

"Well,  they  're  not  any  more,  Miss,"  put 
in  the  swarthy  little  marine  who  had  been 
standing  with  Billy  when  I  first  noticed 
him.  "He  's  a  rum  one,  he  is." 

"What  do  you  mean?" 

"  Nothing  bad  about  him,  y '  understand, 
but  rummy,  downright  rummy,"  he  ex- 
plained, and  all  the  others  grunted  or 
nodded  their  agreement. 

"Has  he  been  here  long?"  I  asked. 

"Ever  since  we  have.  He  was  with  us 
over  in  France,  too.  Came  in  with  some 
replacements  just  before  we  got  into  that 
scrap  at  Belleau  Woods ;  'bout  this  time 
last  year,  it  was.  He  'd  been  sick  or 
something  and  got  left  behind  his  own 
crowd.  Had  a  pal  with  him,  though, 
tow-headed  chap,  sort  of  chunky." 

"Jim  Wilson?"  I  guessed. 

"Yeah,  something  like  that.  Thick  as 
thieves  they  were,  and  this  Murdock  fellow 


112  SERGEANT  JANE 

used  to  cut  up  pretty  lively  with  him. 
They  were  only  with  us  about  a  week 
before  we  got  into  the  mix-up.  Very  first 
day  that  other  fellow  —  Wilson,  did  you 
say  his  name  was  ?  —  got  his.  Murdock 
took  it  pretty  hard,  and  then  that  same 
night  he  went  out  with  a  patrol,  and  the 
whole  bunch  were  reported  missing.  Just 
after  that  the  Boches  got  through  to  us 
and  cut  us  up  somethin*  awful  —  gee !  — " 

He  broke  off,  thinking  of  the  horrors  of 
that  desperate  week.  "And  Murdock, 
what  became  of  him?"  I  prompted  mildly. 

"Oh,  we  never  saw  him  again  till  after 
the  armistice.  Then  he  came  back  from 
prison,  looking  as  though  he  'd  been  to 
hell  (excuse  me,  Miss),  and  he  's  been  with 
us  ever  since." 

"But  why  do  you  say  he's  queer?"  I 
persisted. 

"I  dunno  exactly,"  he  answered  slowly. 
"  He  hardly  ever  talks  and  has  n't  made 
any  pals,  and  he  's  fierce  absent-minded. 


I  AM  GIVEN  A  PRESENT  113 

Always  seems  to  have  something  on  his 
mind  and  goes  off  by  himself  moonin' 
when  he  's  off  duty,  'stead  of  getting  into  a 
little  game  or  taking  a  swim  like  the  rest 
of  us.  He  's  a  rum  one,  all  right." 

We  talked  a  little  longer,  but  I  could  n't 
learn  anything  more  in  explanation  of 
Murdock's  queerness,  so  I  said  good  night 
and  hurried  home.  I  had  promised  never 
to  stay  out  after  dark  with  the  canoe,  and 
besides  I  was  anxious  to  tell  Father  about 
Billy. 

However,  the  Hunters  had  come  over  to 
play  bridge,  and  I  did  n't  have  a  chance  to 
talk  to  Daddy.  I  puzzled  over  it  myself 
while  I  was  undressing.  I  did  n't  even 
have  Martha  to  confide  in,  for  she  had 
begged  to  stay  down-stairs  just  a  little 
longer  after  I  had  come  up.  She  adored 
Mrs.  Hunter  and  tried  to  imitate  every- 
thing about  her,  from  her  Southern  accent 
to  the  way  she  did  her  hair. 

Hunting  in  my  top  bureau  drawer  for  a 


114  SERGEANT  JANE 

handkerchief,  I  happened  to  catch  the 
end  of  a  piece  of  blue  ribbon.  (Mother 
always  said  that  neat  bureau  drawers 
were  the  sign  of  a  perfect  lady,  so  I  knew 
I  would  never  be  even  an  imperfect  one.) 
On  the  end  of  the  ribbon  was  a  key. 

"Well,  Jane  Graves,"  I  demanded  of 
my  image  in  the  glass,  "how  ever  did  you 
forget  about  the  secret  passage  ?  I  'm  going 
to  hunt  for  it  right  away." 

I  slipped  the  ribbon  around  my  neck  and 
fell  asleep,  planning  ways  to  get  into  the 
fortress. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

I  GO  EXPLORING 

NEXT  morning  Jimmy  was  leaving 
the  breakfast  table  just  as  I  came 
down. 

"Ecthcuth  me,  pleath,"  he  said  most 
politely.  "I  have  to  do  my  thpelling." 

"Certainly,  son,"  Father  replied,  adding 
when  Jimmy  was  out  of  earshot,  "I  wish 
some  one  would  tell?  me  what  has  come 
over  that  child." 

"It  is  queer,"  Mother  agreed,  wrinkling 
her  forehead  the  way  she  does  when  she  's 
perplexed. 

"Is  Jimmy  getting  queer,  too?"  I  asked, 
reaching  for  a  muffin. 

"She  admits  it  at  last,"  grinned  Martha, 


116  SERGEANT  JANE 

deliberately  moving  the  dish  of  preserves 
to  her  side  of  the  table. 

I  decided  to  ignore  her.  "You  re- 
member Billy  Murdock,  don't  you, 
Daddy?"  I  continued.  "A  jolly,  red- 
haired  boy  who  used  to  be  in  Company 
D." 

"By  Jove  —  (Father  had  gotten  very 
English  since  he  went  to  France)  —  By 
Jove,  then  I  was  n't  mistaken.  I  thought 
I  recognized  him  at  drill  several  times,  but 
I  could  never  find  him  afterward." 

So  I  told  him  what  had  happened  last 
night  and  what  the  other  men  said  about 
Billy. 

"It  does  seem  queer  and  very  unlike  the 
boy  as  I  remember  him,"  he  agreed.  "But 
he  's  probably  just  got  a  grouch,  or  is  in 
love,  or  something  of  the  sort.  I  '11  try  to 
have  a  talk  with  him,  though." 

"Please  do,  Father,"  I  begged.  "I  can't 
imagine  what  has  made  him  change  so. 
But  what 's  queer  about  Jimmy?" 


I  GO  EXPLORING  117 

Mother  and  Dad  looked  at  each  other, 
tried  hard  not  to  smile  and  then  laughed 
shamelessly. 

"He's  a  perfect  imp,  and  we  oughtn't 
to  laugh  at  him,"  Dad  chuckled,  "but  I'll 
never  forget  the  expression  on  Mr.  Ken- 
yon's  face  when  those  pigs  came  down  the 
aisle." 

"  What  pigs  ?    What  aisle  ?  "  I  demanded. 

"Well,"  Father  drawled  tantalizingly, 
"our  good  friend,  the  Reverend  Mr. 
Kenyon,  was  holding  his  regular  weekday 
service  in  the  mess  hall  last  evening  and 
discoursing,  quite  impressively,  on  the  text, 
'Cast  not  your  pearls  before  swine.' 
Right  in  the  middle  of  a  particularly 
eloquent  bit,  the  men  began  to  grin  and 
nudge  each  other.  The  Reverend  Kenyon 
had  his  back  to  the  door  and  did  n't  notice 
anything  unusual  until  the  men  started  to 
snicker.  He  saw  them  all  looking  toward 
the  doorway  and  turned  around  angrily, 
to  find  three  very  fat  and  very  pink  little 


118  SERGEANT  JANE 

pigs  staring  at  him  with  mildly  inquiring 
expression,  as  though  demanding  the  where- 
abouts of  the  forbidden  pearls." 

"Go  on,"  I  giggled. 

"That  was  all  —  and  quite  enough. 
The  meeting  broke  up  in  confusion,  the 
pigs  proved  to  be  the  ones  the  Hunters 
are  raising  in  that  lot  below  the  tennis 
court,  and  Jimmy  'fessed  up  as  to  how  they 
got  there.  He  'd  been  sent  on  an  errand 
to  the  chaplain's  study  yesterday  afternoon 
and  had  happened  to  notice  the  text  he 
was  writing  about." 

"Ye  gods,"  I  exclaimed  in  admiration, 
"what  will  that  ki  —  boy  do  next!  But 
I  'd  hardly  callit  unusual." 

"Oh,  that 's  not  the  queer  part,"  Mother 
explained.  "You  know  how  he  used  to 
hate  being  sent  to  bed  for  a  punishment?" 

"And  would  beg  to  be  spanked  instead? 
Of  course  I  do." 

"Well,  he  doesn't  seem  to  object  to  it 
at  all  since  we  've  been  down  here ;  did  n't 


I   GO  EXPLORING  119 

say  a  word  when  I  ordered  him  to  bed  right 
after  supper  for  a  week.  He  was  up  there 
all  evening,  and  yet  he  has  n't  done  his 
lessons." 

"I'm  almost  sure  there  wasn't  any 
light  in  his  room  when  I  came  in  from 
canoeing,"  I  said  thoughtfully.  "I  wonder 
—  oh,  I  bet  anything  I  know !  Wait  a 
minute,  and  I  '11  find  out." 

I  jumped  up  from  the  table  and  tore 
upstairs.  Jimmy  was  sitting  at  his  desk, 
with  his  spelling  book  open  in  front  of 
him. 

"That  was  some  stunt  you  pulled  off 
with  the  pigs,"  I  remarked  casually,  throw- 
ing myself  down  on  his  bed.  "How  did 
you  ever  think  of  it?" 

"Eathy  ath  pie,"  he  replied  non- 
chalantly, though  I  could  tell  he  was  as 
pleased  as  Punch  by  my  admiration. 
"Betty  Ellen  helped  me  get  'em  there. 
Don't  you  let  on  about  that,  though.  Gee, 
Thith,  you  ought  to  've  theen  old  Kenyon'th 


120  SERGEANT  JANE 

fathe ! "  Jimmy  laughed  happily  at  the 
memory. 

"You  got  yours  for  it  all  right,  though, 
didn't  you?"  I  asked  sympathetically. 
"A  whole  week  in  your  room ;  that 's 
tough.  Maybe  I  can  get  Dad  to  give  you 
a  licking  instead.*' 

"You'd  better  not,"  said  Jimmy; 
"might  get  in  wrong  yourthelf.  I  don't 
mind  it  much." 

I  was  lying  with  my  head  at  the  foot  of 
the  bed,  by  this  time.  There  was  a  big 
window  just  to  the  left  of  the  headboard, 
and  I  had  a  perfect  view  of  the  broad, 
green  court  between  our  house  and  the 
barracks.  Some  of  the  chairs  had  been 
left  out  from  last  night's  entertainment. 

"All  right,  if  you  don't  mind,"  I  said, 
getting  up  and  sauntering  out  of  the  room. 
"Better  hurry  up,  it 's  after  eight." 

I  found  the  rest  of  the  family  on  the 
porch.  "Jimmy  sends  his  love,"  I  an- 
nounced, "and  asks  me  to  tell  you  that  he 


I   GO  EXPLORING  121 

forgives  you  for  the  cruel  punishment  you 
are  inflicting  upon  him.  It  is  n't  half  bad 
to  be  sent  to  bed  when  you  can  lie  there  and 
watch  moving  pictures  every  night ! " 

It  took  over  two  weeks  for  Timmons  to 
finish  my  double  paddle  and  for  me  to 
learn  to  use  it. 

Then  came  the  Fourth  of  July  and  a  big 
celebration  at  the  Post.  At  least  half  the 
town  turned  out  to  watch  the  troops 
maneuver  on  the  parade  ground  and  cheer 
the  winner  in  a  championship  baseball 
game.  In  the  evening  we  had  fireworks 
and  Japanese  lanterns,  and  the  cooks  had 
made  a  huge  pile  of  sandwiches  and  a  regular 
well  of  lemonade,  that  disappeared  in 
double-quick  time.  It  was  a  sizzling  hot 
day,  but  such  a  jolly  one  that  even  our 
English  friends  confessed  that  they  were 
extremely  glad  we  had  an  Independence 
Day  to  celebrate. 

We  were  busy  at  school,  too,  with  basket- 
ball games  and  end-of-the-term  quizzes 


122  SERGEANT  JANE 

and  a  French  play  Nicolette  was  coaching, 
so  that  I  did  n't  have  many  spare  minutes. 
When  I  did  get  out  in  the  Sweetheart, 
Timmons  or  Jimmy  or  Madelon  or  Martha 
would  be  with  me,  or  else  there  would  be 
people  on  the  grass  plot  around  the  fortress 
or  rowing  near  the  bank,  so  that  there  was 
no  chance  of  visiting  it  undisturbed. 

However,  one  evening  just  after  supper, 
I  managed  to  get  away  without  any  one 
seeing  me  and  slipped  down  with  the 
current  into  the  shadow  of  the  fortress 
walls.  There  was  no  one  in  sight,  and  I 
hurriedly  fastened  the  canoe  and  scrambled 
out  on  to  the  bank.  The  strip  of  grass 
was  little  wider  than  a  path  and,  keeping 
close  to  the  walls,  I  could  move  along  with- 
out being  seen  from  either  the  town  or  the 
barracks. 

Under  the  central  part  of  the  fortress 
was  the  saluting  battery,  which  I  knew 
would  be  fired  again  at  eight  o'clock. 
That  left  only  two  walls  that  could  possibly 


I   GO  EXPLORING  123 

contain  an  opening  of  any  kind,  and  I 
hurriedly  inspected  their  stony  red  sur- 
faces. There  seemed  to  be  plenty  of  cracks 
in  them,  and  I  eagerly  pushed  against  one 
hard  surface  after  another.  Suddenly,  at 
the  bottom  of  the  wall  nearest  the  town,  a 
stone  moved  ever  so  slightly  under  my 
fingers.  I  pushed  it  back  slowly,  for  it 
was  heavy,  and,  kneeling  down,  looked  into 
an  irregularly  shaped  opening  about  three 
feet  high  and  two  wide.  It  was  pitch 
dark,  as  far  as  I  could  see,  and  I  hesitated 
a  while  before  I  crawled  gingerly  in. 

Once  inside  I  found  I  could  stand  upright, 
and  as  my  eyes  grew  a  little  accustomed 
to  the  darkness,  I  could  make  out  the  walls 
of  a  small  room.  I  felt  around,  bumping 
against  a  chair  and  a  table,  and  finally  dis- 
covered on  a  little  shelf  the  light  I  was  sure 
must  be  somewhere  about.  It  proved  to 
be  a  flashlight,  the  largest  and  most  power- 
ful I  had  ever  seen,  and  with  its  bright  rays 
I  explored  every  corner  of  the  room. 


124  SERGEANT  JANE 

It  was  narrow  and  fairly  long.  There 
was  a  thick  rug  on  the  stone  floor,  a  shelf 
along  one  side  that  held  a  pile  of  books 
and  several  magazines  —  and,  of  course, 
the  table  and  chair  my  shins  had  already 
discovered. 

"What  a  peachy  hiding  place!"  I  said 
out  loud.  "  I  'm  glad  I  'm  the  only  one 
who  knows  about  it." 

I  knew  the  men  would  be  coming  down 
soon  to  fire  the  battery,  so  I  only  stopped 
to  make  sure  that  my  key  fitted  the  inner 
door  and  to  take  one  look  into  the  gloomy 
cellar  of  the  fortress,  before  closing  up  the 
passage  and  starting  home  in  the  Sweetheart. 

"I  '11  be  back  soon,"  I  promised,  as  I 
looked  back  and  tried  to  recognize  the 
cracks  that  marked  the  opening.  "It 's 
the  wall  beyond  the  battery.  Joshua,  but 
it  does  seem  queer  to  find  everything  just 
the  way  Lieutenant  Duncan  described  it 
that  night  at  Norfolk!" 


CHAPTER  IX 

LAZY  DAYS 

SCHOOL  closed  the  thirtieth  of  July, 
and    the    very   next    day   it    began 
to    rain.       Jimmy    was    disgusted. 
"What  ith  the  uthe  of  havin*  a  vacation, 
if  it  rainth  all  the  time,"  he  wanted  to  know, 
after  we  had  been  shut  up  in  the  house 
for  three  days  and  had  read  all  the  books 
and  painted  all  the  pictures  and  played 
all  the  games  Mother  could  suggest. 

"I  'm  sick  of  staying  in,  too,"  I  admitted, 
getting  up  from  the  floor,  where  we  had 
been  carrying  on  a  world  war  with  tin 
soldiers  and  Father's  old  maps  of  the  front. 
"Let 's  see  if  Mother  will  let  us  go  out." 
After  we  had  argued  a  little  about  how 


126  SERGEANT^  JANE 

hot  it  was  and  how  good  rain  water  was 
for  the  complexion  and  so  forth,  she  gave 
us  permission,  and  we  dressed  up  in  our 
oldest  clothes  and  raincoats  and  rubbers 
and  started  out  into  a  very  wet  and  slippery 
world.  Martha  was  going  over  to  Mrs. 
Hunter's  to  learn  how  to  make  a  smock, 
and  we  teased  her  about  her  big  umbrella 
and  pretended  we  were  going  to  splash 
her,  until  she  began  to  run.  Of  course 
she  ran  right  into  a  great  big  puddle  and 
got  as  furious  with  us  as  if  we  had  put  the 
puddle  there  on  purpose. 

"I  'm  going  to  tell  Mother  this  minute," 
she  shrieked,  splashing  muddy  water  all 
over  herself;  but  we  had  decided  that  it 
was  about  time  for  us  to  be  elsewhere  and 
were  tearing  down  through  the  garden  as 
fast  as  we  could  go.  We  climbed  along 
the  breakwater  and  went  out  on  the  wharf. 
The  tide  was  so  high  that  when  we  teetered 
up  and  down  on  the  boards,  the  water 
leaked  through  the  cracks. 


LAZY   DAYS  127 


"Letth  climb  up  on  the  bpathouthe 
roof,"  Jimmy  suggested. 

We  chose  the  smallest  house,  and  by 
stepping  on  Jimmy's  locked  hands,  I 
managed  to  scramble  on  to  the  roof, 
although  it  was  very  slanty.  Then  I 
held  on  with  one  hand  and  helped  Jimmy 
up  with  the  other.  As  soon  as  we  were 
comfortably  settled,  it  began  to  pour 
bucketsful,  but  we  were  so  close  to  the 
water  that  it  seemed  almost  like  being  on 
a  boat,  and  it  was  such  fun  we  hated  to 
leave. 

"Letth  pretend  we  're  being  wathed  away 
in  a  flood  that  made  uth  get  out  of  our 
houthe  on  to  the  roof,"  Jimmy  proposed. 

"Yes;  and  the  children  are  in  the  third 
story,"  I  added.  "We  forgot  all  about 
them  in  the  excitement." 

"But  we  wouldn't,  Jane." 

"Well,  then,  the  door  got  jammed,  and 
we  could  n't  get  to  them.  But  I  don't 
believe  they  're  drowned  yet,  and  per- 


128  SERGEANT   JANE 

haps  you  can  get  them  out  through  the 
window." 

Jimmy  went  to  the  rescue  of  the  perish- 
ing children,  lying  on  his  stomach  and 
hanging  down  to  look  into  the  window, 
while  I  held  his  feet.  And  right  then  and 
there  I  nearly  killed  my  one  and  only 
brother,  for  I  happened  to  look  toward 
the  wharf,  and  a  marine  was  running  toward 
the  deep-water  end  as  though  he  were 
going  to  jump  right  off. 

I  was  so  startled  that  I  half  let  go  of 
Jimmy's  feet,  and  he  howled  wildly  as  he 
started  to  slip.  The  man  stopped  quickly 
at  the  sound  and,  turning  around,  began  to 
run  in  our  direction.  But  before  he 
reached  us,  Jimmy  had  managed  to 
scramble  back  to  my  side  and  was  calling 
me  all  sorts  of  names  for  trying  to  murder 
him. 

"What  are  you  kids  doing  up  there?" 
demanded  the  stranger. 

My  hair  was  plastered  down  by  the  rain 


LAZY   DAYS  129 

and  sticking  into  my  eyes,  but  I  finally 
shook  it  out  and  looked  down,  —  to  dis- 
cover Billy  Murdock  standing  below,  look- 
ing cross  and  very  wet. 

"We  're  jutht  playing,"  Jimmy  told  him 
meekly. 

"Well,  you  *d  better  come  down  before 
you  kill  yourselves.  Here  —  slide  and  I  '11 
catch  you." 

He  helped  us  both  to  the  ground  and 
then,  before  I  could  even  thank  him, 
turned  on  his  heel  and  walked  rapidly 
away. 

"He  is  queer,"  I  exclaimed.  "Come  on, 
Jimmy,  let 's  run." 

We  raced  back  to  the  house,  and  Mother 
helped  us  put  on  dry  clothes,  and  told  us 
that  Mrs.  Hunter  was  having  a  candy  pull 
and  we  were  to  go  right  over. 

We  did  n't  have  to  be  invited  twice, 
and  when  we  had  broken  the  record  for 
getting  to  Hunters',  we  found  them  all  in 
the  kitchen,  with  big  aprons  tied  around 


130  SERGEANT   JANE 

their  necks,  taking  turns  at  stirring  a  pan 
of  molasses  that  was  bubbling  away  on  the 
stove  and  sending  forth  a  most  delicious 
smell. 

"Heah  come  the  wateh  babies!"  cried 
Mrs.  Hunter. 

"I  suah  hope  you  all  got  enough  wateh 
to  last  a  while,"  added  Martha,  and  we  were 
so  glad  to  find  her  peaceably  inclined  that, 
for  once,  we  did  n't  pay  any  attention  to 
her  would-be  Southern  accent. 

The  candy  was  soon  ready  to  pull,  and 
all  of  us,  from  the  Captain  down  to  Betty 
Ellen,  who  pranced  around  in  the  pinkest 
and  frilliest  of  aprons,  getting  in  every- 
body's way,  pulled  and  pulled  and  pulled, 
until  we  were  sticky  from  head  to  foot, 
and  had  laughed  ourselves  weak  and  eaten 
enormous  quantities  of  taffy.  We  put 
what  was  left  on  a  platter  to  cool,  and  Mrs. 
Hunter  took  us  upstairs  to  wash  off  a  little 
of  the  stickiness. 

"What    a    pehfectly     dahling    powdeh 


LAZY  DAYS  131 

box — "  Martha  was  gushing,  when  there 
suddenly  came  wild  yells  from  downstairs 
and  the  crash  of  broken  china,  and  Betty 
Ellen,  shrieking  for  her  mother,  started  up 
the  steps. 

We  all  ran  to  the  head  of  the  stairs. 
"What  is  the  matteh,  deah?"  Mrs.  Hunter 
inquired  anxiously,  holding  out  her  arms  to 
catch  the  youngster,  as  she  tripped  over  her 
long  apron  and  wept  more  loudly  than  ever. 

"It 's  Jimmy,  it 's  Jimmy,  Mother," 
she  sobbed.  "He's  killing  Donny — " 

Martha  and  I  raced  down  to  the  kitchen. 
The  platter,  broken  into  a  dozen  pieces, 
was  lying  on  the  floor,  together  with  bits 
of  sticky  taffy  and  two  squirming  boys. 
Jimmy  was  on  top  of  Don,  and  judging 
from  the  latter's  shrieks,  was  slowly  and 
painfully  murdering  him. 

"James  Graves  !"  Martha  cried,  grabbing 
his  shoulder  and  trying  to  pry  him  loose. 
"Stop  it  this  instant.  Stop  hitting  poor 
little  Donny." 


132  SERGEANT  JANE 

She  finally  got  him  away  and  shook  him 
hard.  I  did  n't  blame  her  a  bit,  for  it 
certainly  seemed  to  be  a  plain  case  of 
assault  and  battery,  and  against  his  host 
at  that.  Still  I  knew  that  Jimmy  would 
have  something  to  say  for  himself. 

Mrs.  Hunter,  with  Betty  Ellen  clinging 
to  her  skirts,  was  in  the  kitchen  by  this 
time,  and  so  was  Captain  Hunter,  who  had 
turned  back  on  his  way  to  the  barracks, 
at  the  sound  of  the  rumpus.  Donny  had 
stopped  crying,  and  was  sitting  up  and 
glaring  ferociously  at  Jimmy,  who  had 
his  hands  in  his  pockets  and  seemed  as 
cool  as  a  cucumber,  although  Martha  still 
held  his  collar  and  would  shake  him  every 
now  and  then,  sort  of  absent-mindedly. 

"Well,  well,  what 's  all  this?"  asked  the 
Captain,  looking  straight  at  Jimmy. 

"We  were  fighting,  thir,"  stated  Jimmy, 
not  at  all  embarrassed. 

"  So  I  see.     But  what  about  ?  " 

"I  'd  rather  not  thay,  thir,"          .; 


LAZY  DAYS  133 

Captain  Hunter  looked  surprised  and 
turned  to  his  own  son.  "Donny,  what 
were  you  fighting  about?" 

Donny  kicked  the  table  leg  but  made  no 
reply. 

"Donald,  what  were  you  fighting 
about?" 

There  was  no  defying  that  tone,  and  it 
all  came  out  in  one  breath.  "  Motheh  told 
us  not  to  take  any  moan  candy  aftah  she 
put  it  on  the  platteh  till  she  said  we  could, 
and  I  was  taking  some,  and  Jimmy  saw  me 
and  said  I  must  n't,  and  I  said  I  did  n't 
have  to  mind  him,  he  hit  me  and  then  we 
fought." 

"That  was  no  reason  for  fighting,  Jimmy. 
Just  wait  till  I  tell  Father.  Why  did  you 
hit  him?"  Martha  shook  the  culprit  at 
the  end  of  each  sentence. 

"I  — I'll  tell  Father  mythelf,"  he 
gulped.  "Donny  wath  dithobeying 
orderth ;  he  wath.  I  'm  a  marine,  and 
I  have  to  do  what  our  motto  tellth  uth 


134  SERGEANT  JANE 

to,  don't  I,  thir?"  he  appealed  to  Captain 
Hunter. 

"Which  motto?"  questioned  the  Cap- 
tain. 

Jimmy's  eyelid  quivered.  He  was  either 
winking,  or  trying  to  keep  from  crying  — 
and  Jimmy  never  cried.  Then  he  said 
very  innocently :  "  Our  war  thlogan,  I 
mean,  thir.  Firtht  to  fight,  thir!" 

"Run  along  to  your  father,  boy,"  ordered 
the  Captain,  making  an  unsuccessful 
attempt  to  turn  a  chuckle  into  a  cough. 
"And  tell  him  you  Ve  been  illustrating  the 
Tank  Corps  motto  1  as  well  as  our  own." 

After  a  week  of  steady  rain,  it  cleared 
for  a  day,  and  for  the  rest  of  our  vacation 
the  sun  shone  over  half  the  time.  Every 
morning  we  played  tennis  or  went  for  a 
paddle;  and  in  the  afternoon  we  either 
went  over  to  Mosquito  Bay  for  a  swim  or 
watched  the  men  play  baseball.  Evenings 
there  were  movies  or  vaudeville  shows  and 

1  The  Tank  Corps  motto  was  "  Treat  'em  rough." 


LAZY  DAYS  135 

more  paddling,  especially  when  Timmons 
and  I  took  Father  for  long  trips  up  the  bay 
while  the  moon  was  full. 

Martha  went  to  the  informal  dances 
the  officers  gave  every  Friday  evening  hi 
the  court  and  spent  long  afternoons  sewing 
and  talking  with  Mrs.  Hunter.  Usually 
when  she  went  in  next  door,  I  would  saunter 
down  to  the  fortress,  watch  my  chance  to 
slip  unobserved  into  the  secret  room  and, 
curled  up  on  a  pile  of  cushions,  spend 
happy  hours  sailing  up  the  coast  of  Scot- 
land with  David  Balfour  or  stubbornly 
holding  back  a  heavier  team  in  the  shadow 
of  my  own  goal  posts  by  the  side  of  my 
beloved  Dink  Stover.  It  was  always  cool 
in  there,  and  I  blessed  Lieutenant  Duncan 
a  thousand  times  for  telling  me  about  his 
secret. 

Madelon  and  Therese  came  down  to 
spend  a  week  with  us,  and  we  had  the 
jolliest  time,  —  picnics  and  swimming 
parties  and  boat  rides  every  day.  Mrs. 


136  SERGEANT  JANE 

Hunter  gave  a  little  tea  for  Martha  and 
Therese  and  some  of  the  younger  officers. 
She  asked  us  beforehand  if  we  would  like 
to  come,  and  I  was  scared  to  death  Madelon 
would  say  yes,  but  she  did  n't.  She  was 
very  polite  about  refusing,  though,  and 
Mrs.  Hunter  told  Mother  afterward  that 
she  had  never  known  a  girl  of  her  age 
with  such  charming  manners. 

"Sapristi!"  Madelon  whispered  to  me 
after  her  talk  with  Mrs.  Hunter.  "If  I 
had  had  to  go  to  her  old  tea,  I  should  have 
died  in  a  feet !  Let  's  get  Mr.  Timmons 
and  go  out  in  the  canoe." 

The  night  the  Clerets  left,  after  making 
us  promise  to  come  to  the  plantation  for  a 
week  in  October,  I  came  upstairs  just 
before  dinner  and  noticed  Martha's  door 
standing  open.  I  stuck  my  head  into  her 
room,  intending  to  repeat  some  barracks' 
gossip  Timmons  had  told  me,  but  kept  it 
there  for  an  entirely  different  purpose. 

Martha  was  sitting  in  front  of  her  dress- 


She  studied  her  reflection  in  the  mirror,  smiled,  rolled  her  eyes 
and  changed  to  the  other  elbow.  —  Page  137. 


LAZY   DAYS  137 


ing  table,  with  her  back  to  me  and  entirely 
unconscious  of  my  presence.  She  had  her 
hair  done  a  new  way,  with  puffs  over  her 
ears,  and  was  leaning  an  elbow  on  the  table 
and  resting  her  chin  gracefully  on  her  hand. 
She  studied  her  reflection  in  the  mirror, 
smiled,  rolled  her  eyes  and  changed  to  the 
other  elbow. 

"Oh,  Lieutenant  Pohtah,  you  don't  cayeh 
if  I  give  away  youah  othah  dance,  do 
you?"  I  heard  her  murmur,  pouting  her 
lips  and  looking  sideways  out  of  her  eyes. 

I  stared  at  her  stupidly,  hardly  able  to 
believe  my  own  ears.  Then  she  rested 
her  chin  on  both  hands  and  lowered  her 
eyelashes  demurely.  "I  wondah  if  you 
would  get  my  cape  from  the  house  (No, 
that  hasn't  enough  Vs'  in  it,"  she  in- 
terrupted herself).  "I  wondah,"  she  began 
again,  after  a  minute's  thought,  "  I  wondah 
if  I  might  bothah  you  to  ask  Mothah  foh 
my  scyahf,  then  we  could  wandah  in  the 
gyahden — " 


138  SERGEANT   JANE 

"Stick  to  one  part  of  the  South  while 
you  're  about  it,"  I  interrupted,  coming 
out  of  my  trance.  "Don't  mix  Virginia 
and  Tennessee  and  Georgia  all  in  one 
sentence." 

Martha  jumped  as  though  she  had  been 
shot,  at  the  sound  of  my  voice,  and  blushed 
crimson.  "  How  long  have  you  been  there, 
Jane  Graves?"  she  demanded.  "What  do 
you  mean  by  eavesdropping  and  spying 
and—" 

"Your  door  was  wide  open,  and  I 
happened  to  be  passing,"  I  replied  with 
great  dignity.  "I  am  exceedingly  sorry 
that  I  overheard  you,  for,  although  I  Ve 
always  suspected  you  of  being  a  fool,  I 
never  imagined  anything  as  bad  as  this!" 

"As  bad  as  what?  Just  wait  till  I  tell 
Mother  what  a  sneak  you  are.  I  '11  — " 

"  Go  ahead ;  and  I  '11  tell  her  how  you 
sit  and  make  eyes  at  yourself  in  the  mirror 
and  practice  idiotic  speeches.  How  will 
you  like  that?  Of  all  simple,  conceited, 


LAZY   DAYS  139 


smirking,  pie-faced  copycats,  you  take  the 
prize!"  I  stalked  into  my  own  room  and 
banged  the  door. 

Martha  followed  me,  as  I  knew  she 
would,  and  begged  me  not  to  tell.  I  was 
disgusted,  though,  and  I  knew  how  to 
drive  Martha  almost  frantic. 

"Please,  Jane,"  she  pleaded.  "I  know 
it  was  silly,  and  I  never  did  it  befoah." 

"Befoah?"  I  echoed  softly. 

"Oh,  for  heaven's  sake,  don't  start  that. 
I  '11  go  crazy." 

"Crazy?"  I  repeated,  still  more  quietly. 

"Honestly,  Jane,  can't  you  listen  to  me 
a  minute?" 

"Minute?" 

"Oh,  stop  it!  I'll  never  speak  to  you 
again,  if  you  tell  any  one.  Therese  put  it 
into  my  head,  and  I  was  only  doing  it  for 
fun." 

"Fun?" 

At  that  point  Martha  burst  into  tears 
and  slapped  me  in  the  face.  I  slapped  her 


140  SERGEANT  JANE 

back;  and  then  we  both  felt  a  lot  better, 
although  we  would  n't  admit  it.  The 
dinner  gong  rang  before  we  could  start  the 
argument  again,  and  we  hurried  to  wash 
our  faces  and  get  down  on  time. 

Of  course,  I  did  n't  tell  any  one  about 
Martha's  private  theatricals,  but  for 
months  I  could  make  her  do  anything  in 
the  world  for  me  by  simply  whispering, 
"then  we  can  wandah  in  the  gyahden." 


CHAPTER  X 
AT  "LA  PATRIE" 

ONE  Saturday  near  the  end  of  Octo- 
ber,   Madelon    and    Therese    and 
their  big  brother  Pierre  came  down 
for   us   in   the   old   motor-truck   that   M. 
Cleret  had  bought  from  the  Post  to  convey 
his  numerous  sons  and  daughters   to  and 
from  the  Convent  School. 

Pierre  was  a  tall,  jolly  boy  of  nineteen, 
with  tumbled  brown  hair  and  a  skin  tanned 
by  work  on  the  plantation  until  it  was  as 
dark  as  a  native's.  He  drove  the  rattly, 
worn-out  truck  with  one  hand,  keeping  up 
a  steady  stream  of  foolish  remarks,  and 
bumped  us  from  side  to  side  on  the  hilly 
road  until  our  teeth  chattered. 


142  SERGEANT  JANE 

"Here  we  are,"  he  announced,  as  we 
topped  a  last  hill  and  turned  with  a  jerk 
into  a  narrow  driveway. 

We  jumped  out  hastily  and  thankfully, 
and,  laden  with  suitcases  and  packages  of 
groceries  that  the  girls  had  bought  in  town, 
followed  Therese  up  the  flagged  path  to 
the  big,  rambling  white  farmhouse.  It 
was  a  wonderfully  homelike  and  friendly 
house ;  vines  almost  completely  covered  its 
white  walls  and  even  stuck  inquiring  ten- 
drils over  the  edge  of  the  scarlet  roof; 
around  the  doorway  was  a  trellis  of  climb- 
ing white  roses;  crisp  curtains  fluttered 
at  every  window,  and  from  between  one 
pair  of  them  at  least  floated  out  a  delicious 
odor  of  freshly  baked  bread. 

"Ou  est  Maman?"  called  Therese,  and 
in  a  minute  we  were  surrounded  by  a 
swarm  of  little  Clerets,  who  came  dashing 
out  of  the  door  and  around  the  corners  of 
the  house  and  threw  themselves  upon  us 
with  shouts  of  delight. 


AT   "LA  PATRIE"  143 

"Eh,  bien,  Ma'amselles,"  plump,  jolly 
Madame  Cleret  beamed  at  us  from  the 
doorway.  "Eet  ees  fine  that  you  have 
come.  Nous  sommes  heureux  de  vous  voir, 
Monsieur  Cleret  et  moi.  Come  een;  come 
een." 

The  children  took  our  packages  and  bags 
and  escorted  us,  laughing  and  chattering 
like  little  magpies,  to  a  cunning  bedroom 
on  the  second  floor,  with  a  sloping  roof,  and 
white  furniture  decorated  with  formal 
painted  bouquets  of  pink  and  blue  flowers. 

"Madelon,"  Madame  Cleret  called  up 
the  stairs,  as  we  were  trying  to  unpack  our 
bags,  with  a  great  many  would-be  helpers 
giggling  and  pushing  and  getting  in  each 
others'  way,  "Madelon,  depeches-toi  et  dites 
a  Gerta  que  vous  etes  arrivees.  Ne  voulez- 
vous  diner  pas?" 

We  most  certainly  did  want  to  dine  and 
hurriedly  washed  our  hands  so  as  not  to 
keep  them  waiting.  "It 's  enough  to  feed 
a  regiment,"  I  whispered  to  Madelon,  as 


144  SERGEANT  JANE 

we  sat  down,  fifteen  strong,  at  a  long  white- 
painted  table  set  with  blue  doilies  and 
loaded  down  with  good  things  to  eat. 

I  soon  discovered,  though,  that  Madame 
Cleret  knew  more  about  the  appetites  of 
her  happy-go-lucky  family  than  I  did,  for 
cold  meats  and  steaming  vegetables,  hot 
and  spicy  in  true  Creole  style,  salads  and 
preserves,  heaping  piles  of  bread  and  rolls, 
crisp  French  cakes  and  cookies  and  huge 
pitchersful  of  milk  disappeared  as  if  by 
magic.  And  such  joking  and  laughing  and 
chattering  accompanied  their  disappear- 
ance ! 

Every  one,  from  tall,  thin  Papa  Cleret, 
with  his  bald  head  and  twinkling  blue  eyes, 
down  to  the  curly -headed  baby  in  her  high 
chair,  adopted  us  on  the  spot  and  treated 
us  to  laughing  comments,  sometimes  in 
English,  but  just  as  often  in  French,  fre- 
quent helpings  of  everything  eatable  in 
sight  and,  from  the  youngest  members, 
occasional  sticky  hugs  and  kisses. 


AT   "LA  PATRIE"  145 

"Wait  a  minute,"  I  begged,  during  a 
moment's  comparative  quiet,  "I  want  to 
get  you  all  straightened  out." 

"Shoot  away,"  laughed  a  brown-haired 
boy  opposite  me.  "Who  am  I?" 

"Pierre,  of  course,"  I  replied  confidently, 
only  to  have  them  burst  into  perfect 
roars  of  laughter. 

"So  you've  forgotten  me  already," 
called  the  real  Pierre  from  the  other  end 
of  the  table.  "Jacques  will  be  so  conceited 
from  that  compliment  there  will  be  no 
living  with  him." 

By  way  of  reply,  Jacques,  who  was  a 
year  younger  than  his  brother  but  looked 
almost  exactly  like  him,  tried  to  start  a 
rough-and-tumble  fight  on  the  spot.  But 
Madame  Cleret's  quiet  "Allans,  mes 
enfants"  sent  them  back  to  their  seats, 
and  I  continued  my  inventory. 

"I  know  Madelon  and  Therese,  of 
course,  and  Ma'amselle  Nicolette  and  Pierre 
and  Jacques,  that  makes  five;  Marie- 


146  SERGEANT  JANE 

Louise,  with  the  black  curls,  is  six,  and  the 
twins  make  eight  — " 

"And  are  eight,"  Madelon  interrupted 
to  tease  the  two  tow-headed  boys  who  were 
staring  at  me  in  wide-eyed  curiosity. 

"Et  moi!  Et  mai!"  piped  up  Jean- 
Christophe,  upsetting  the  marmalade  jar 
in  his  excitement.  "  J'ai  cinq  ans." 

"Five  years  old !  Well,  you  are  a  big 
boy !  What 's  this  cherub's  name  ?  "  I 
asked,  rescuing  the  spoon  the  baby  had 
thrown  on  the  floor. 

"Jolie,"  they  all  answered  at  once,  and 
I  did  n't  wonder  they  called  her  that,  for 
pretty  she  surely  was,  with  her  golden 
curls  and  pink  cheeks  and  big  dark  eyes. 

"I  think  big  families  are  the  nicest 
things  in  the  world,"  I  sighed  enviously. 

"So  do  I,"  agreed  the  boy  who  was 
sitting  beside  me.  He  was  Winston 
Roberts,  a  friend  of  Pierre's  and  an  only 
child. 

"Sometimes   they   are,"   said    Madelon, 


AT   "LA  PATRIE"  147 

making  a  face  at  Jacques,  who  had  just 
helped  himself  to  her  currant  bun. 

The  longer  we  stayed  at  La  Patrie, 
though,  the  more  strongly  we  decided  in 
favor  of  a  large  number  of  brothers  and 
sisters.  There  was  n't  a  dull  minute. 

Papa  Cleret  took  us  all  around  the 
plantation,  which  was  almost  the  last  one 
of  its  kind  on  the  island,  and  we  saw  the 
sugar  cane  being  cut  in  the  fields  and  drawn 
in  oxcarts  to  the  crushing  mill.  He  ex- 
plained that  he  did  not  do  his  own  "re- 
fining" but  shipped  the  raw  sirup  to  a 
manufacturer  hi  Porto  Rico,  as  that  proved 
to  be  more  profitable. 

"We'll  never  get  reech;  non,  jamais" 
he  said  whimsically.  "But  eet  gives  us 
enough  to  pay  for  food  and  for  clothes, 
and  we  are  verry  happy  —  a  La  Patrie" 

"Why  do  you  call  it  that?"  I  asked. 
"I  've  always  wondered." 

"When  we  came  way  off  here  and  left 
noire  chere  Alsace,  il  y  a  bien  des  annees" 


148  SERGEANT  JANE 

he  explained,  "we  were  verry  homeseeck 
for  a  while,  Maman  and  I;  so  we  named 
our  plantation  La  Patrie  —  the  Mother- 
land —  and  so  eet  has  come  to  be  for  us." 

"Yes,"  Madelon  teased,  "they  even  grow 
red  flowers  in  blue  window-boxes  against  the 
walls  of  the  house,  so  that  our  flag  is  always 
in  sight,  n'est-ce  pas,  mon  pere  ?  " 

We  played  tennis  almost  every  day  and 
croquet,  and  at  night  we  danced,  while 
Madame  Cleret  played  on  a  tinkly  old- 
fashioned  piano  and  Monsieur  on  his  violin. 
We  learned  to  ride  the  good-natured  little 
gray  donkeys  that  M.  Cleret  kept  to  draw 
his  loads  of  sugar  sirup  down  to  the  wharf, 
and  on  their  sturdy  backs  explored  the 
trails  over  the  hills  in  every  direction. 
Whenever  the  boys  could  leave  their  work, 
they  came  with  us,  and  Winston  dropped 
in  almost  daily,  to  see  Pierre,  he  said,  but 
he  was  seldom  far  from  Therese. 

On  one  of  our  trips  we  rode  down  to 
the  Chachas  settlement  west  of  Charlotte 


AT   "LA  PATRIE"  149 

Amalie,  to  get  some  hats.  When  Therese 
proposed  it,  I  had  n't  any  idea  whether 
Chachas  were  animals  or  Bolshevists  or 
some  new  kind  of  fruit,  and  I  said  as  much. 
Martha  looked  at  me  pityingly,  although 
I  was  sure  she  had  never  heard  of  them 
either,  and  it  was  Madelon  who  supplied 
the  information. 

"They  're  the  descendants  of  French 
refugees  who  fled  years  ago  from  other 
islands  because  of  religious  persecution," 
she  explained.  "The  name  is  supposed  to 
come  from  our  word  'chercher'  —  to  seek. 
They  have  always  lived  in  that  one  settle- 
ment and  have  intermarried  until  most  of 
them  are  half-witted  or  at  best  hopelessly 
stupid,  but  they  manage  to  live  by  fishing 
in  the  bay  and  farming  patches  of  hill  land, 
and  they  do  make  the  nicest  hats ! " 

"It 's  funny  you  've  never  heard  of 
them  before,"  began  Martha. 

"Yes?"  I  said  politely.  "Perhaps  it 
was  because  I  never  wandahed  in  the  — " 


150  SERGEANT  JANE 

"Oh,  look  at  those  lovely  blue  flowers," 
Martha  interrupted  hastily,  turning  to 
Jacques.  "Won't  you  get  me  some?" 

"For  the  gyahden?"  I  asked  wickedly. 

Her  only  answer  was  to  dig  her  heels 
sharply  into  the  sides  of  her  astonished 
donkey  and  tear  ahead  of  us  down  the 
road,  leaving  a  much-bewildered  Jacques 
to  jog  off  in  pursuit. 

The  Chachas  were  uninteresting,  scrawny- 
looking  people,  and  there  was  nothing  at 
all  picturesque  about  their  dirty  village, 
but  the  hats  they  had  for  sale  were  so  light 
and  wide-brimmed  and  so  beautifully  woven 
that  we  each  bought  one  and  rode  proudly 
back  to  La  Patrie  with  our  new  headgear 
flopping  in  the  breeze. 

Another  afternoon  Christine  Dann  gave 
a  tea  for  some  of  the  Convent  School  girls, 
and  the  four  of  us  dressed  up  in  our  starch- 
iest organdies  and  rattled  down  to  town  in 
the  motor-truck. 

It  was  an  alarmingly  formal  affair,  call- 


AT   "LA  PATRIE"  151 

ing  for  many  curtsies  and  much  exchanging 
of  compliments.  Some  of  the  Sisters  were 
there,  and  a  number  of  Mrs.  Dann's  friends ; 
so  we  chatted  politely  about  the  weather 
and  how  we  were  enjoying  our  vacation 
and  whether  we  had  seen  the  new  play  at 
the  Apollo.  Once  in  a  while  a  little  group 
of  girls  would  get  off  together  in  a  corner, 
and  for  a  few  minutes  the  whispering 
would  be  fast  and  furious. 

"Don't  ever  tell  I  asked  you,"  I  heard 
Martha  murmuring  to  Mary  Deane,  "but 
do  you  know  how  to  tell  whether  you  're 
in  love  or  not?" 

"Yes,  indeed,  Mrs.  Larkin,"  I  replied 
sweetly,  as  that  portly  lady  stopped  to 
shake  my  hand,  "we  all  think  St.  Thomas 
is  delightful." 

" — not  nearly  so  attractive  as  Pierre," 
I  caught  the  tail-end  of  Mary  Deane's 
reply,  as  Mrs.  Larkin  moved  on  to  her  next 
victim. 

"Of      course      tastes      differ,"   Martha 


152  SERGEANT  JANE 

whispered  haughtily.  "Maybe  it  is  a  good 
thing.  Jacques  told  me  yesterday — " 

"What  about  Therese  and  Winston?" 
interrupted  Mary  Deane. 

"Oh,  they  're  practically  engaged. 
Don't  ever  tell  I  said  so,  though." 

This  was  more  than  enough  for  me  and, 
stopping  only  long  enough  to  whisper 
"gyahden"  in  Martha's  ear,  I  hurried 
across  the  room  to  Madelon,  who  was 
beckoning  me.  "Eats,"  she  announced 
under  her  breath,  as  a  neat  colored  maid 
appeared  in  the  doorway  with  a  two-story 
tray. 

"They  've  forgotten  the  other  slice,"  I 
whispered  in  horror,  as  the  tray  approached 
us,  for  it  was  piled  high  with  near-sand- 
wiches, single  pieces  of  bread  spread  with 
all  sorts  of  things,  pressed  meats,  tomatoes, 
pickles  and  even  tiny  sausages. 

"Sh!"  Madelon  admonished  me. 
"Have  n't  you  ever  been  to  a  Danish  tea 
before?" 


AT   "LA  PATRIE"  153 

"No;  but  I  like  Danish  sandwiches,"  I 
answered  a  minute  later,  biting  into  a 
crunchy  pickle. 

"Just  wait  till  you  taste  some  of  their 
fruit  ices  and  fancy  cakes,"  she  advised, 
and  I  soon  discovered  why,  for  I  never  ate 
anything  so  delicious  in  my  life  as  the  apri- 
cot ice  and  the  chocolate  and  nut  pastries 
that  the  double-decker  tray  brought  in  on 
its  next  trip.  If  Pierre  hadn't  appeared 
with  the  truck  when  he  did,  I  would  have 
eternally  disgraced  myself,  and  as  it  was  I 
accounted  for  three  ices  and  at  least  a 
dozen  cakes  before  I  left  and  was  quite 
truthful  when  I  assured  Mrs.  Dann  that 
I  had  had  a  delightful  time. 

The  last  evening  of  our  visit  at  La  Patrie 
we  went  for  a  hayride,  —  only  instead  of  a 
hayrack  we  had  a  motor-truck,  and  instead 
of  hay,  sugar-cane  stalks  covered  with  army 
blankets.  We  rode  over  to  the  woods  north 
of  Bluebeard's  Castle,  parked  the  truck  in 
a  clearing  and  piled  out,  babies,  baggage 


154  SERGEANT  JANE 

and  all.  The  boys  built  a  fire  and,  after 
we  had  cooked  bacon  over  it  on  long,  forked 
sticks,  they  put  potatoes  in  the  ashes  to 
roast. 

When  we  had  eaten  a  delicious  picnic 
supper  and  explored  the  woods  to  our  hearts' 
content,  we  started  the  fire  again  and  sat 
in  a  circle  around  it  while  Papa  Cleret 
told  us  stories  of  Alsace  and  of  his  early 
days  in  St.  Thomas,  until  the  baby  and 
Jean-Christophe  fell  sound  asleep,  and 
Maman  said  we  had  better  start  for  home. 

"I  've  had  such  a  good  time,  Madelon," 
I  whispered,  as  we  sat  squeezed  in  beside 
Pierre  on  the  front  seat  of  the  truck.  "I 
just  love  La  Patrie  and  all  your  family,  and 
I  'm  so  glad  you  asked  me  to  visit  you." 

"  Eet  's  been  fun  great  having  you, 
Jane  Graves,"  she  declared,  hugging  me 
tighter.  "You  must  come  soon  again." 

"Indeed  she  must,"  seconded  Pierre. 
"  Tu  V aimes  beaucoup,  n'est-ce  pas,  petite 
scaur?" 


AT   "LA  PATRIE"  155 

"fa  va  sans  dire;  est-ce  que  tu  ne  I 'dimes 
pas  aussi?" 

I  did  n't  understand  them,  but  I  was  too 
sleepy  to  care ;  and  I  thought  happily  that 
school  would  soon  begin  again,  and  then 
I  would  see  Madelon  every  day. 


CHAPTER  XI 

A  ST.  THOMAS  CHRISTMAS 

UT  we  must  have  a  Christmas 
tree."  Jimmy  had  been  rapidly 
acquiring  front  teeth  and  almost 
as  rapidly  losing  his  lisp  during  the  weeks 
that  had  flown  by  since  we  started  back 
to  school  the  first  of  November.  "We 
could  n't  have  a  Christmas  without  one." 

We  were  holding  a  family  council  in 
front  of  the  fireplace  in  the  living  room, 
which  boasted  a  roaring  fire,  almost  the 
first  we  had  had. 

"Where  shall  we  ever  get  one?"  Martha 
asked  practically,  looking  up  from  the 
fluffy  white  sweater  she  was  knitting  for 
Betty  Ellen.  "There  are  n't  any  fir  trees 
on  the  island,  are  there,  Daddy?" 


A  ST.   THOMAS  CHRISTMAS         157 

Father  took  a  long  puff  at  his  cigarette, 
laid  down  his  magazine  and  gave  the  matter 
due  consideration. 

"The  cypresses  up  in  the  hills  are  prob- 
ably the  only  evergreens  we  have,  and 
they  're  a  bit  unwieldy.  But  why  not 
use  one  of  those  baby  oak  trees  we're 
experimenting  with  along  the  driveway  ? 
The  Major  told  me  only  yesterday  that 
they  were  getting  so  big  he  would  have  to 
take  out  a  few." 

"Fine,"  Jimmy  agreed  enthusiastically. 
"Let 's  go  get  one  right  away." 

So  Daddy  and  I  went  with  him,  and 
Timmons  helped  us  dig  up  a  thick,  evenly- 
rounded  little  tree,  whose  topmost  leaf 
came  just  even  with  my  forehead.  Jimmy 
and  I  carried  it  to  the  garden  and  then 
trotted  over  to  the  barracks  for  an  old 
wooden  washtub  we  had  seen  hanging  in 
the  outhouse. 

"There,  now,  she  oughtn't  to  die  for 
some  time,"  said  Timmons,  as  he  packed 


158  SERGEANT  JANE 

down  the  last  spadeful  of  earth  around  the 
roots  of  the  tree  and  sent  Jimmy  running 
for  a  watering  pot. 

"  Where  shall  we  put  it,  Daddy  ?  "  I  asked. 

"I  think  the  porch  will  be  the  best  place. 
The  men  will  want  to  see  it,  I  know, 
and  that  will  give  us  plenty  of  room." 

The  two  men  moved  the  tree,  tub  and 
all,  into  the  most  sheltered  corner  of  the 
porch  and  then  went  off  to  town  in  the 
car,  —  Father  to  inspect  the  patrol  and 
Timmons  to  meet  the  boat  and  get  the 
mail.  I  saw  Jimmy  run  out  the  back 
door  and  join  them,  and  I  almost  decided 
to  go  too,  for  the  steamer  from  New  York 
only  came  twice  a  month,  but  it  was  only 
two  days  till  Christmas,  and  I  still  had  a 
lot  to  do  on  the  pink  silk  kimono  I  was 
making,  under  Mother's  direction,  for 
Martha. 

"Mother!"  I  called,  finding  the  living 
room  empty.  "Where  are  you?" 

"In   the  storeroom,"  came  the  muffled 


A  ST.  THOMAS  CHRISTMAS         159 

reply,  and  I  ran  upstairs  to  find  her  leaning 
over  an  open  trunk  and  scattering  Christ- 
mas-tree decorations  and  red  and  white 
stockings  and  odds  and  ends  of  ribbon 
and  bright-colored  paper  all  over  the  room. 

Martha  was  sorting  things  out  as  well 
as  she  could  and  had  a  string  of  imitation 
holly  wreaths  over  her  arm  and  a  roll  of 
dark  green  cr£pe  paper  in  her  hands. 

"Just  what  I  want,"  I  cried,  grabbing 
the  paper  and  picking  up  a  long  piece  of 
scarlet  ribbon  from  the  floor. 

Martha  demanded  them  back,  of  course, 
and  came  running  downstairs  after  me. 
But  when  she  saw  the  tree,  she  forgot  all 
about  wanting  the  paper  for  herself  and 
helped  me  wrap  it  around  the  tub  and  tie 
it  in  place  with  the  red  ribbon. 

"  Does  n't  it  look  great  ? "  she  cried, 
stepping  back  to  inspect  her  handiwork. 
"I  think  it 's  lots  prettier  than  a  regular 
tree." 

"So  do  I.     I  can't  wait  to  see  how  it 


160  SERGEANT   JANE 

will  look  all  trimmed.  Let 's  get  the 
things  right  away." 

So  we  went  up  and  helped  Mother  finish 
unpacking  her  almost  endless  stores  of 
Christmas  things  and  then  carried  the 
tree  trimmings  down  to  the  porch  and 
went  to  work.  I  was  just  fastening  the 
last  big  red  ball  to  the  highest  branch, 
when  we  heard  the  automobile  stop  in 
back  of  the  house  and  then  Jimmy's  voice. 

"Hi  there,  girlth,"  he  called,  lisping 
because  he  was  so  excited.  "Come  help 
uth.  Hurry  up  !  We  Ve  got  thome  load ! " 

I  beat  Martha  down  the  path  by  half  a 
second  and  found  Dad  and  Jimmy  almost 
buried  under  packages  and  boxes  of  every 
possible  size  and  shape.  Timmons  had 
just  gotten  out  and  was  lifting  a  huge 
wooden  crate  from  the  seat  beside  him. 

"Santa  Claus  has  discovered  St.  Thomas 
at  last,"  Father  chuckled,  piling  my  arms 
full  of  packages  and  turning  to  give  Martha 
her  share. 


A  ST.   THOMAS  CHRISTMAS         161 

"Hecuba!"  I  exclaimed  (I  had  begun 
Spanish  in  school  and  realized  its  advan- 
tages already).  "Did  these  all  come  on 
the  boat?" 

"They  most  certainly  did;  and  you'll 
find  that  they  're  marked,  '  No  admittance ' 
till  day  after  to-morrow." 

Some  of  them,  though,  we  did  open,  for 
we  had  all  commissioned  Uncle  Jim  to  buy 
things  for  us  in  New  York.  It  was  most 
exciting,  because  we  would  open  presents 
meant  for  ourselves  and  have  them  hastily 
grabbed  out  of  our  hands;  and  once 
Martha  shouted,  "Oh,  Jane,  here 's 
Mother's  hand  — . "  She  stopped  there, 
though,  and  Mother  either  did  n't  hear  her 
or  pretended  not  to  have  noticed  any- 
thing. 

There  were  dozens  of  mysterious  bundles 
from  our  friends  and  relatives  back  in  the 
States,  and  after  we  had  wrapped  and 
labeled  each  others'  presents,  we  carried 
them  all  upstairs  and  added  them  to  the 


162  SERGEANT  JANE 

pile  already  hidden  in  the  "Christmas 
closet"  in  Mother's  room,  to  which  she 
alone  had  the  key. 

The  big  wooden  crate  that  Timmons  had 
carried  in  was  still  standing  on  the  porch, 
and  Father,  with  a  chisel  and  hammer,  had 
just  pried  off  the  wooden  top. 

"Oh!"  shrieked  Martha,  lifting  one 
corner  of  the  excelsior  pad. 

"Oh!  Oh!"  echoed  Jimmy,  lifting  an- 
other. 

Then  I  jerked  off  the  pad  entirely,  and 
we  all  started  exploring.  There  were  fat 
five-pound  boxes  of  our  favorite  candy, 
bags  of  pink  and  white  popcorn,  piles  of 
striped  peppermint  canes  and  baskets  and 
shiny  candy  animals ;  there  were  fruit- 
cakes and  puddings  and  ginger  cookies, 
raisins  and  nuts,  and  in  the  very  bottom  a 
big  box  of  candied  fruits. 

"Daddy,  you  angel !"  we  cried,  all  falling 
on  him  at  once. 

"You    do    think    of    the    nicest    things, 


A  ST.   THOMAS   CHRISTMAS         163 

Father,"  I  complimented.  "It  will  be 
just  like  Christmas  at  home." 

"That 's  what  I  'm  hoping,"  he  smiled, 
trying  to  free  himself  from  our  three  pairs 
of  arms.  "Maybe  it  will  be  even  nicer 
than  the  original." 

Christmas  morning  dawned  clear  and 
warm.  The  sea  had  never  looked  so  blue 
and  sparkling,  nor  the  field  so  freshly  green, 
as  they  did  on  our  way  into  town  to  attend 
the  early  service  at  All  Saints  Church. 
Charlotte  Amalie  itself,  with  its  many- 
colored  houses,  against  the  green  of  the 
hills,  might  have  been  a  giant's  Christmas 
tree. 

The  little  church  was  well  filled,  and  the 
service  in  the  cool  half-darkness  before 
the  candle-lit  altar  was  beautiful.  While 
it  lasted,  I  felt  as  though  I  were  back  in 
the  chapel  at  Norfolk,  and  it  was  like 
waking  from  a  dream  to  come  out  into  the 
bright,  hot  sunlight  and  hear  the  holiday 
greetings  of  our  St.  Thomas  friends. 


164  SERGEANT  JANE 

When  we  got  back  to  the  house,  our 
stockings,  full  to  bursting,  were  dangling 
temptingly  before  the  fireplace.  Jimmy 
fell  on  his  with  a  whoop  of  delight,  and  we 
were  n't  far  behind  him.  Then,  while 
Mother  and  Daddy  sat  on  the  davenport 
and  smiled  upon  us  beatifically,  we  filled 
the  room  with  tissue  paper  and  ribbon 
and  with  shrieks  of  joy  at  each  new  dis- 
covery. 

"A  penknife!  Oh,  jimmy,  what  a 
beauty!" 

"Oh,    Mother,    how    did    you    know    I' 
wanted  a  new  fountain  pen?" 

"Look,  Jane,  a  collar  and  cuff  set  just 
like  Mrs.  Hunter's!" 

"Hecuba!  What  a  peach  of  a  painting 
box!" 

"Say,  what's  this?" 

"Silk  stockings!" 

"Oranges  —  no,  they  're  tennis  balls." 

In  only  too  short  a  time  we  were  down  to 
the  last  little  package  in  the  end  of  each  toe. 


A   ST.   THOMAS  CHRISTMAS         165 

We  knew  that  the  best  was  always  last,  so 
we  opened  them  slowly. 

"A  watch!"  cried  Martha,  the  first  to 
get  her  present  unwrapped. 

"A  watch!'*  repeated  Jimmy,  proudly 
hunting  for  the  proper  pocket.  "Gee,  a 
real  watch !" 

While  I  just  sat  staring  blissfully  at  a 
darling,  tiny,  eight-sided  silver  watch  on  a 
band  of  black  ribbon  that  just  fitted  my 
wrist. 

"You  angelic  parents,"  we  shouted, 
coming  to  our  senses  and  half  smothering 
them  with  grateful  hugs  and  kisses. 

"You  no  eat  a  little  somethings  at  all 
this  morning?"  inquired  Sam,  grinning 
at  us  from  the  doorway. 

"You  bet  we  do,  Sam,"  Jimmy  replied 
eagerly.  "  Merry  Christmas  ! " 

After  breakfast  there  were  more  presents, 
brought  down  from  the  Christmas  closet 
in  pillowcases  and  distributed  with  great 
ceremony  by  Jimmy.  Only  one  person 


166  SERGEANT  JANE 

was  allowed  to  unwrap  at  a  time,  so  that 
the  rest  of  the  family  might  have  a  chance 
to  inspect  and  admire  every  present. 
Mother  was  delighted  with  her  gray  suede 
handbag  and  had  n't  guessed  at  all,  in 
spite  of  Martha's  break;  and  Father 
thought  his  toilet  set  the  most  gorgeous 
he  had  ever  seen. 

As  for  me,  every  time  I  'd  get  a  present 
and  begin  to  think  that  there  was  n't 
anything  left  in  the  world  that  I  could  wish 
for,  Jimmy  would  hand  me  just  the  one 
thing  I  had  been  wanting  for  years. 
Martha  had  knitted  me  a  stunning  yellow 
sweater,  just  the  right  shade  to  match  the 
Sweetheart;  and  Jimmy  had  remembered 
her,  too,  for  his  present  was  a  tiny  search- 
light. Daddy  gave  me  half  a  dozen  books 
that  I  could  hardly  wait  to  read,  and 
Mother's  present  was  a  French  blue  kimono 
just  like  Martha's  pink  one.  I  wondered 
guiltily  if  she  knew  how  I  had  envied 
Martha  hers  all  the  time  I  was  making  it. 


A   ST.   THOMAS   CHRISTMAS         167 

Then  there  were  hair-ribbons  and  hand- 
kerchiefs and  sachets  by  the  dozen,  writing 
paper  and  silk  stockings,  a  desk  set  and  a 
new  tennis  racket  from  friends  at  home  and 
in  St.  Thomas. 

"There  never  was  any  one  so  lucky,"  I 
sighed  happily,  when  the  last  pillowcase 
had  been  emptied. 

"Oh,  yes,  there  was,"  contradicted 
Martha,  dancing  around  the  room  with 
an  apricot-colored  evening  dress  over  her 
smock,  a  mandolin  in  one  hand  and  a 
bunch  of  flowers  in  the  other. 

"Huh !  Who  wants  old  flowers  and 
clothes,"  shouted  Jimmy  contemptuously 
from  the  porch,  where  he  was  trying  to 
roller-skate  and  play  a  single-handed  game 
of  baseball  at  the  same  time. 

Timmons  had  been  invited  to  dinner, 
which,  according  to  Jimmy,  was  "some 
feed."  He  loudly  expressed  his  thanks 
for  the  pipe  I  had  had  sent  down  from 
New  York  for  him.  Daddy  had  suggested 


168  SERGEANT   JANE 

it,  and  I  was  so  glad  that  he  had,  for 
Timmons  seemed  more  pleased  with  it  than 
with  any  of  the  handkerchiefs  and  socks 
and  candy  the  rest  of  them  showered  upon 
him. 

All  of  the  officers  and  most  of  the  men 
dropped  in  during  the  afternoon.  They 
admired  the  tree  and  ate  the  candy  canes 
and  popcorn  and  told  jokes  and  funny 
stories,  or  else  grew  reminiscent  about 
their  homes  and  explained  that  they  had  n't 
had  this  kind  of  a  Christmas  since  they 
were  "kids." 

In  the  evening  the  men  gave  a  play, 
which  was  a  take-off,  written  by  two  of 
the  lieutenants,  on  the  usual  sob-stuff 
Christmas  story,  all  about  a  poor,  fragile, 
young  coal  carrier  who  was  overcome  by 
the  heat  on  Christmas  Eve  on  a  doorstep 
in  Charlotte  Amalie.  It  was  full  of  local 
hits  and  personalities,  and  it  was  hard  to 
tell  who  enjoyed  it  more,  the  actors  or  the 
audience.  There  were  mock  presents  to 


A  ST.   THOMAS   CHRISTMAS         169 

the  officers,  too,  and  candy  and  cigarettes 
"all  round"  and  a  great  amount  of  cheering 
and  singing  to  end  up  with. 

Last  of  all  we  piled  the  car  full  and  drove 
into  Charlotte  Amalie  to  hear  the  Christ- 
mas carols.  Bands  of  singers  went  around 
from  house  to  house,  playing  on  guitars 
and  mandolins  and  a  queer,  harsh-sounding 
instrument  that  Lieutenant  Porter  told  us 
was  called  a  scratchy-scratch  and  made 
from  a  calabash.  Some  of  the  carols  were 
ones  we  had  known  always,  and  it  seemed 
so  strange  to  hear  them  rising,  to  such 
weird  accompaniments,  in  the  streets  of 
the  Sweetheart  of  the  West  Indies. 

About  midnight  all  the  singers  joined 
forces  in  Emancipation  Park  and,  as  we 
drove  slowly  home  in  the  moonlight,  their 
voices  came  to  us  softened  by  distance. 

"How  about  it,  Jinks?"  Daddy  whis- 
pered, putting  his  arm  around  me.  "Was 
it  almost  as  good  as  home?" 

"Better,"  I  whispered  back. 


170  SERGEANT   JANE 

But  Jimmy  heard  us  and  sleepily  raised 
his  head  from  Mother's  knee.  "Whadda 
ye  mean,  better  'n  home,"  he  murmured 
drowsily.  "Thith  ith  home,  thilly !" 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  NEW  YEAR'S  FETE 

SINCE  almost  our  first  day  in  St. 
Thomas  we  had  been  hearing 
about  the  New  Year's  celebration. 
"That 's  the  big  day  here,  rather  than 
Christmas,"  the  girls  at  school  had  ex- 
plained. "Everybody  wears  fancy  cos- 
tumes and  masks,  and  at  daybreak  a  big 
crowd  goes  and  sings  under  the  mayor's 
balcony  until  he  comes  out  and  makes  a 
speech  and  has  his  servants  give  them 
things  to  eat.  Of  course,  those  are  only 
the  poorer  people,  but  in  the  evening  almost 
everybody  goes  out  on  the  streets,  and 
those  who  don't,  hold  open  house  for  the 
mummers." 

A  whole  crowd  of  us  planned  to  go  in 


172  SERGEANT  JANE 

from  the  barracks  early  in  the  evening, 
and  later  Martha  and  I  were  going  to  a 
dinner  party  at  Mary  Deane's. 

Major  Edwards  asked  me  to  be  his 
"partner",  and  I  decided  that  we  would 
have  original  costumes,  if  I  could  do  any- 
thing about  it.  "Anybody  can  be  a  gipsy 
or  a  clown,"  I  explained  to  him.  "But  we 
can  think  of  something  better,  I  know." 

"What's  this?"  he  asked  in  pretended 
astonishment.  "Me  dress  up  —  an  old 
man  like  me  ?  " 

"I  would  hardly  call  you  old,  sir," 
I  protested  diplomatically.  "Of  course 
you  're  going  to  wear  a  costume ;  you 
can't  go  if  you  don't." 

"Well,  well,"  he  chuckled,  "if  you  say 
so,  I  suppose  I  have  to  do  it.  Let  me  know 
what  it 's  to  be." 

I  puzzled  my  brains  for  two  days  and 
finally  told  the  Major  that  he  might  wear 
his  uniform,  if  he  would  put  on  a  false 
mustache  and  carry  a  cane.  "You  see  — " 


THE   NEW   YEAR'S   FETE  173 

I  explained,  and  he  was  delighted  with  my 
scheme. 

When  New  Year's  evening  came,  Mother 
was  n't  feeling  well  and  Father  did  n't 
want  to  go  without  her,  so  Captain  and 
Mrs.  Hunter  promised  to  chaperon  us, 
turning  themselves  into  a  wicked-looking 
pair  of  gipsies  as  an  aid  to  performing 
their  duties.  Betty  Ellen  and  Donny  made 
a  cunning  Pierrette  and  Pierrot,  and  Jimmy, 
a  red-nosed  clown,  never  left  them  for 
long.  Martha  had  on  a  Colonial  costume 
that  had  been  in  the  family  for  generations, 
and  she  numbered  among  her  cavaliers  an 
Indian  warrior,  a  Bolshevist  and  a  ballet 
dancer  with  pink  maline  skirts  and  a  deep 
bass  voice. 

They  had  all  assembled  in  the  living 
room,  and  I  could  hear  the  rumble  of  their 
voices  and  every  now  and  then  Martha's 
silvery  giggle.  "Jane,"  she  called  at  last, 
"ahn't  you  evah  coming?  We've  been 
waiting  pehfect  ages." 


174  SERGEANT   JANE 

"On  my  way,"  I  replied,  tripping  grace- 
fully down  the  stairs. 

I  had  the  satisfaction  of  seeing  Martha's 
mouth  fly  open  and  her  face  turn  scarlet, 
and  then  — 

"Bless  my  soul,  can  this  be  Jane?" 
gasped  the  Major. 

"Right  you  ahe,  old  thing,"  I  cooed. 
"As  soon  as  I  get  my  scyahf  from  Mothah, 
we  can  staht." 

They  all  stood  and  stared  at  me;  and 
it  was  n't  much  wonder.  I  had  found  an 
old  black  evening  dress  of  Mother's  in  the 
storeroom  and  cut  out  a  breadth  to  make  it 
good  and  tight ;  my  hair,  which  I  had  been 
coaxing  to  grow  since  I  came  to  St.  Thomas, 
was  rolled  under  and  stuck  out  on  the 
sides  in  huge  puffs ;  I  could  n't  find  any 
rouge,  but  I  had  painted  a  beautiful  hectic 
flush  on  each  cheek  with  my  pink  water-color 
paint  and  had  powdered  my  nose  until  it 
looked  like  a  marshmallow ;  I  wore  an 
artificial  red  rose  at  my  waist  and  another 


THE   NEW   YEAR'S   FETE  175 

in  the  "vampish"  black  chiffon  hat  which 
had  once  belonged  to  Ma'amselle  Nicolette ; 
the  scarf,  which  I  needed  mostly  for  con- 
versational purposes,  was  a  spangly  one 
and  very  long. 

"Don't  you  all  admihe  my  cahnival 
costume?"  I  drawled. 

"Jane  Graves,  you  can't  go  to  town  and 
to  Mary  Deane's  in  that  disgusting-looking 
dress,"  stormed  Martha. 

"No?"  I  inquired  politely.  "Then  I  Jll 
have  to  wandeh  in  the  gyahden." 

I  thought  that  would  have  a  quieting 
effect,  and  it  did.  She  turned  on  her  heel 
without  another  word  and  stalked  down 
the  path,  her  bodyguard  straggling  after 
her. 

When  we  reached  Charlotte  Amalie,  we 
found  the  streets  crowded  with  maskers 
and  ankle-deep  in  confetti.  All  sorts  of 
instruments  were  being  played,  and  we 
stopped  on  Main  Street  to  watch  the 
dancers.  I  never  saw  such  wiggling  and 


176  SERGEANT  JANE       , 

squirming  in  my  life;  they  seemed  to 
move  every  muscle  in  their  bodies,  swaying 
from  side  to  side  and  backwards  and  for- 
wards in  time  to  the  hideous  screechings 
of  the  scratchy-scratch.  Their  costumes 
seemed  to  be  in  layers,  each  of  a  different 
though  equally  brilliant  color. 

"Sort  of  contagious,  isn't  it?"  laughed 
Lieutenant  Porter,  twirling  around  on  his 
toes  until  his  pink  ballet  skirts  stood  out 
straight  around  him.  "Some  class  to  the 
native  'shimmie,'  don't  you  think,  Miss 
Jane-the-Vampire  ?  " 

"Oh,  Lieutenant,"  I  giggled  coyly, 
making  sure  that  Martha  was  listening. 
"Naughty,  naughty,  mahshmallow  whip!'9 

"Come  on;  don't  let's  stand  here  all 
night,"  commanded  an  extremely  haughty 
Colonial  dame,  and  we  moved  up  the  street 
in  search  of  more  excitement. 

I  knew  I  had  Martha's  "Angora"  safe 
in  my  keeping,  for  one  night  at  least,  but 
before  I  had  been  walking  for  half  an  hour, 


THE  NEW  YEAR'S  FETE  177 

I  would  willingly  have  given  it  back  and 
never  attempted  to  get  it  again.  My  skirt 
was  so  tight  that  it  made  my  knees  ache  to 
walk,  my  high-heeled  slippers  made  me  turn 
my  ankle  every  other  step,  my  hair  kept 
falling  down,  and  altogether  I  was  so  hot 
and  cross  and  tired  by  the  time  we  reached 
the  Deanes'  that  the  thought  of  sitting 
through  a  dinner  party  filled  me  with 
horror. 

However,  Mary  pinned  up  my  hair  more 
securely,  and  lent  me  a  pair  of  low-heeled 
pumps  and  admired  my  costume  so  warmly 
that  I  felt  quite  peppy  again  by  the  time 
we  joined  the  other  guests  in  the  drawing 
room.  We  all  wore  masks  and  had  numbers 
pinned  on  our  backs,  and  whoever  guessed 
the  most  people  correctly  was  to  be  given 
a  prize. 

I  recognized  Pierre  right  away,  in  a  Robin 
Hood  costume  of  Lincoln  green,  and  hurried 
over  to  find  out  his  number. 

"Well,   Monsieur,"   I  murmured  shyly, 


178  SERGEANT  JANE 

"you  don't  know  me,  I  see.  But  I  know 
you  —  ah,  yes,  your  image  is  graven  on 
my  heart." 

"Oo   la!   la!"   he   cried,    in    pretended 
terror.     "Beda  Thara  has  captured  me  for 


sure." 


I  saw  that  he  really  did  n't  recognize  me 
and  suggested  that  we  go  around  the  room 
together,  hunting  familiar  voices.  We 
talked  to  Therese  and  to  Winston  Roberts 
and  Anna  Larkin  and  Christine  Dann, 
and  even  to  Madelon ;  none  of  them  recog- 
nized me,  and  most  of  them  thought  Pierre 
was  Jacques. 

"Turn  in  your  lists,"  Mary  called,  "and 
ask  your  partners  for  dinner,  before  you 
unmask." 

"You'll  go  with  me,  won't  you?"  said 
Pierre. 

"Yes,  indeed,"  I  promised.  "My,  these 
masks  are  hot;  let 's  take  them  off." 

"Jane,"  he  gasped.  "Well,  I'll  be — 
hanged !  I  thought  you  were  Martha." 


THE   NEW   YEAR'S   FETE  179 

"And  I  thought  you  were  Pierre!"  I 
cried,  equally  surprised. 

"Which  is  a  good  joke  on  both  of  us," 
laughed  Jacques.  "Come  along;  they're 
starting  into  the  dining  room." 

The  table  was  beautiful,  with  tall  candles 
and  crimson  flowers,  and  it  was  the  liveliest 
dinner  party,  I  'm  sure,  in  the  whole  town. 
I  ate  all  sorts  of  strange  dishes,  that  neither 
looked  nor  tasted  like  anything,  as  Jacques 
said,  "animal,  mineral  or  vegetable,"  and 
talked  tennis  and  swimming  and  the  Marine 
Corps ;  and  whenever  I  saw  Martha  look- 
ing in  my  direction,  I  pretended  to  be 
vamping  Jacques  for  all  I  was  worth. 

"Boys  and  girls — "  began  Mr.  Deane, 
suddenly  rising  at  the  other  end  of  the 
table.  "This  party  to-night  has  a  double 
purpose  —  to  celebrate  the  coming  of  the 
New  Year  and  to  announce  an  engage- 
ment." 

"  W-what  ?  "  I  asked  Jacques.     "  Who  ?  " 

He  smiled  mysteriously  but  refused  to 


180  SERGEANT  JANE 

answer  and,  looking  around  the  table,  I 
saw  that  nearly  every  one  seemed  as  sur- 
prised as  I  certainly  was. 

"Yes,"  Mr.  Deane  continued,  "this  is  a 
very  proud  and  happy  moment  for  me  — 
and  I  greatly  appreciate  the  honor  that  is 
mine  in  being  asked  to  tell  the  glad  news." 

"Go  on,  tell  it,"  some  one  begged,  not 
meaning  to  be  rude. 

But  Mr.  Deane  was  not  to  be  hurried. 
"My  son,  whom  I  believe  most  of  you  know, 
returned  only  last  week  from  the  States, 
where  he  has  been  working  for  the  past 
year.  Did  he  bring  a  bride  with  him? 
No,  indeed ;  he  wanted  a  wife  from  Char- 
lotte Amalie,  because  he  knew  that  the 
girls  of  St.  Thomas  are  the  most  beautiful, 
the  most  charming  and  the  most  lovable 
in  the  world." 

The  boys  applauded  this  eulogy  politely, 
but  he  went  serenely  ahead.  "Billy  thinks 
that  he  has  chosen  the  most  beautiful  and 
charming  of  the  lot  —  and  he  says  he  had 


THE  NEW  YEAR'S   FETE  181 

a  mighty  hard  time  getting  her.  Had  to 
fairly  drag  her  away  from  the  doors  of  a 
convent  and  all  that  sort  of  thing." 

"Nicolette  !"  some  one  cried. 

"Yes,  Nicolette,"  answered  a  merry 
voice,  and  Ma'amselle  herself,  prettier  and 
more  smiling  than  I  had  ever  seen  her, 
appeared  in  the  doorway,  holding  tight 
to  the  coat-tails  of  a  young  giant  with  a 
crooked  smile  and  eyes  like  Mary's. 

"Hurrah!"  we  all  cried,  when  we  could 
get  our  breath.  "Tell  us  all  about  it! 
Show  us  the  ring!  Come  on  in  and  sit 
down!" 

If  the  party  had  been  lively  before,  it 
became  positively  hilarious  now,  and  it 
was  long  past  midnight  before  we  had  sung 
the  last  song  and  drunk  the  last  toast  (in 
sure-enough  English  eggnog)  to  the  future 
bride  and  groom.  Then  the  Clerets  took 
us  home  in  the  truck,  and  Nicolette  told 
us  confidentially  how  she  had  "thought 
she  could  live  without  him,  but  found  she 


182  SERGEANT   JANE 

couldn't"  and  now  could  hardly  wait  to 
be  married,  although  it  would  mean  leaving 
her  beloved  St.  Thomas  and  going  back 
to  the  States  with  him. 

"Jane,"  Martha  asked,  coming  into  my 
room,  as  I  was  braiding  my  hair  in  front 
of  the  mirror,  "don't  you  think  that 's  the 
most  romantic  thing?  She  never  told  him 
she  was  thinking  of  becoming  a  nun,  and 
if  he  had  come  for  her  a  month  later,  she 
would  have  taken  her  vows  and  it  would 
have  been  too  late." 

"  She  'd  probably  have  let  him  know  in 
time,"  I  yawned.  "She  knew  she  wanted 
to  marry  him." 

"All  the  same,  I  think  it 's  just  like  a 
book,"  Martha  protested.  "I  hope  when 
I—" 

"Nicolette  Cleret  is  eight  years  older 
than  you,  so  I  would  n't  begin  worrying 
about  romance  yet,"  I  advised  sleepily. 
"For  goodness'  sake,  shut  up  and  go  to 
bed." 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THE  INEXPLICABLE  MURDOCK 

"  y    TOW  about  that  picnic?"  Father 

I 1     asked    casually,    one    morning 

-*-  -*-  early  in  February,  as  he  pulled 
up  his  chair  to  the  breakfast  table. 

"Yes,  how  about  it?"  agreed  Martha, 
who  had  no  idea  what  he  was  talking  about, 
I  was  sure. 

"What  picnic,  Dad?"  I  asked,  scorning 
to  be  such  a  hypocrite. 

"Hunter  and  I  have  been  talking  of  pay- 
ing a  visit  to  the  Indian  excavations,"  he 
explained.  "It  will  be  an  all -day  trip,  and 
I  thought  we  might  choose  a  Saturday  and 
make  a  picnic  out  of  it." 

"That  would  be  great.  But  who  's  been 
excavating  Indians?" 

"Why,  Jane,  haven't  you  heard  of  the 


184  SERGEANT  JANE 

research  work  the  archeologists  are  doing 
at  Magens  Bay  ?  " 

"The  what  the  who  are  doing  where  ?" 

"An  expedition  sent  out  by  the  Museum 
of  the  American  Indian  found  the  remains 
of  an  ancient  village  several  feet  under- 
ground, and  they  are  still  digging  up 
pottery  and  relics  of  different  kinds  from 
mounds  near  the  shore  of  Magens  Bay." 

"Really,  Jane,"  Martha  remarked  pat- 
ronizingly, "  I  should  think  you  would  know 
that,  when  you  've  been  here  over  eight 
months." 

"Is  that  so?"  I  replied  indignantly. 
"Well,  I  '11  bet  ten  dollars  you  'd  never 
heard  of  it  yourself  five  minutes  ago.  You 
always  wait  until  some  one  else  has  asked 
about  something  and  then  act  as  though 
you  had  known  all  about  it  all  the  time." 

"Perhaps  I  heah  of  a  few  things  that  you 
don't,  my  deah." 

"Oh  scratchy-scratch!  You  make  me 
tired!" 


THE   INEXPLICABLE   MURDOCK    185 

"Jane,  Jane,"  Mother  cried  reprovingly, 
"you  must  not  use  that  expression;  and 
you  must  n't  quarrel  with  your  sister." 

"Why,  Mother,"  I  defended  myself, 
"that 's  the  name  of  a  perfectly  good 
musical  instrument.  I  've  told  you  so  lots 
of  times.  Besides,  I  was  n't  fighting  with 
her.  I  would  n't  bother  to  quarrel  with 
her.  She  's  so  everlastingly  — " 

"Come,  come.  Stop  it,  Jinks,"  Father 
interrupted  sternly.  "This  is  n't  getting 
our  picnic  planned.  I  thought  we  would 
take  some  of  the  men  along.  I  suppose 
you  want  Timmons  ?" 

"Of  course.     And  Billy  Murdock." 

"And  Lieutenant  Gordon." 

"Are  Betty  Ellen  and  Donny  going, 
Daddy?" 

"Wait  a  minute,"  Father  begged.  "The 
road  is  too  rocky  for  anything  but  the  old 
truck,  and  that  only  holds  fourteen.  The 
Major  particularly  wants  to  go." 

"We  're  five  and  the  Hunters  make  nine 


186  SERGEANT   JANE 

and  the  Major  ten  and  Timmons  and  Billy 
twelve  and  Martha's  old  lieutenant  thir- 
teen — " 

"And  we  'd  better  take  Tonino  to  relieve 
Timmons  with  the  driving.  So  there  's  our 
party  all  fixed.  We  '11  leave  as  early  as 
possible  next  Saturday  morning,  if  it  is  n't 
too  hot." 

When  Saturday  came  there  was  a  fresh 
ocean  breeze  and,  although  the  ride  up  into 
the  hills  was  so  bumpy  we  pretended  we 
were  on  a  roller  coaster,  we  kept  most 
comfortably  cool  all  day.  When  we  reached 
La  Folie,  Timmons  stopped  the  car,  and  we 
all  piled  out  to  see  the  view.  Directly 
below  us,  in  the  harbor  of  Charlotte  Amalie, 
we  could  make  out  ships  of  almost  every 
nationality,  patiently  waiting  then-  turns 
at  the  coaling  wharves  or  the  dry  dock. 
Along  both  coasts  tiny  green  islands  stood 
out  against  the  blue  of  the  ocean,  and  the 
air  was  so  clear  that  we  could  easily  see 
the  mountain  tops  of  St.  Croix. 


THE   INEXPLICABLE  MURDOCK    187 

From  La  Folie  the  road  ran  down  steeply 
to  the  northeast,  past  the  beautiful  Louisen- 
hoh  estate,  to  the  shore  of  Magens  Bay. 
The  archeologists  proved  to  be  quite  ordi- 
nary-looking men,  with  a  great  fondness  for 
talking.  Probably  they  seldom  had  an 
audience.  They  showed  us  the  mounds 
and  explained  the  special  method  of  exca- 
vation they  used  to  prevent  the  breaking 
of  the  pottery  and  amulets  and  other  things 
they  found. 

We  invited  them  to  share  our  picnic 
lunch  and,  in  return,  they  offered  us  coffee 
and  goats'  milk  and  queer,  spicy  cakes. 
By  the  time  the  last  olive  had  disappeared, 
we  were  beginning  to  wish  that  our  elders 
would  tear  themselves  away.  But  they 
had  apparently  settled  down  for  an  after- 
noon's discussion  and  paid  no  attention  to 
our  winks  and  sighs.  So  Martha  and 
Lieutenant  Gordon  wandered  off  into  the 
woods,  the  youngsters  started  an  elaborate 
game  of  pirate  around  the  mounds  and 


188  SERGEANT  JANE 

holes,  Timmons  and  Antonino  went  on  an 
investigating  tour  of  the  truck's  insides  and 
I  was  left  to  amuse  myself  as  best  I  could. 

I  had  been  trying  for  the  last  six  months 
to  persuade  Murdock  to  talk  to  me,  so 
I  was  n't  exactly  enthusiastic  over  his 
company.  Still  it  was  better  than  nothing, 
and  I  was  always  willing  to  make  another 
attempt. 

"Let 's  go  down  to  the  beach,"  I  sug- 
gested. We  had  been  sitting  near  together 
on  the  edge  of  the  group  surrounding  the 
archeologists,  and  I  knew  that  he  had  n't 
been  listening  to  them  any  more  than  I  had. 

"All  right,"  he  consented,  rather  to  my 
surprise,  and  in  absolute  silence  we  walked 
down  to  the  narrow  strip  of  white  sand  at 
the  edge  of  the  bay. 

"Isn't  it  lovely?"  I  cried  in  delight,  for 
the  water  ran  through  every  shade  from 
pale  green  to  sapphire  blue  and  sparkled 
like  diamonds  in  the  sun. 

"Uh,  huh,"  muttered  Billy  lifelessly  and 


THE  INEXPLICABLE   MURDOCK    189 

stretched  out  on  the  warm  sand  with  his 
back  to  the  shining  bay. 

"What  makes  you  sulk  all  the  time, 
Billy?"  I  demanded,  not  bothering  to  be 
diplomatic  or  even  polite,  for  I  had  tried 
gentler  methods  before.  "I  think  you  're 
awfully  rude ;  and  you  never  used  to  be." 

He  turned  and  looked  at  me  but  made  no 
reply,  except  an  unintelligible  grunt. 

"You  haven't  told  me  a  thing  about 
your  experiences  in  France,"  I  persisted. 
"Or  about  your  sister?  Is  Barbara  still 
at  boarding  school  ?" 

He  looked  at  me  reproachfully  and  blurted 
out :  "  She  's  all  right,  I  guess.  Don't 
want  to  talk  about  it." 

"Don't  want  to  talk  about  Barbara?" 
I  exclaimed  in  surprise.  "Why,  you  never 
could  tell  me  enough  about  her  at  Norfolk. 
You  have  n't  quarreled  with  her,  have  you  ? 
Don't  you  remember  how  happy  you  were 
when  she  came  to  see  you  ?" 

He  stared  at  me  blankly.     "Came  to  see 


190  SERGEANT   JANE 

me?"  he  repeated  dully.  "But  that  was 
before  I  went  to  France." 

"Yes,  Billy,  just  before  you  sailed.  She 
must  be  very  proud  of  you  now,  for  she 
surely  knows  how  bravely  you  fought  at 
Belleau  Wood.  I  wish  you  would  tell  me 
all  about  it  —  and  about  being  taken 
prisoner." 

"Prisoner!"  he  cried  wildly.  "No! 
No  !"  And  flinging  himself  face  downward 
on  the  sand,  he  began  to  sob. 

I  had  never  seen  a  man  cry  before  in  my 
life  and  was  horribly  embarrassed.  I  patted 
him  on  the  shoulder  and  tried  to  tell  him 
to  cheer  up  —  and  then  I  suddenly  had  an 
idea. 

"Billy,"  I  cried,  "you  Jve  been  shell- 
shocked,  haven't  you?" 

But  he  only  sobbed  more  loudly,  and 
I  was  afraid  some  one  would  hear  him. 

"Brace  up,  old  man,"  I  begged  (that 
being  the  only  thing  I  could  think  of  that 
seemed  appropriate  for  comforting  a  man). 


THE   INEXPLICABLE   MURDOCK     191 

"You  mustn't  go  on  like  this.  You're 
still  upset  in  your  —  er,  in  your  nerves, 
I  guess." 

He  was  crying  more  quietly  now  and 
sounded  so  like  Jimmy  used  to  when  he 
was  smaller  and  fell  and  hurt  himself,  that 
I  unconsciously  began  patting  his  head  as 
I  talked. 

"I've  read  about  it  a  lot,  Billy;  and 
about  people  losing  their  memories  as  a 
result.  Is  that  why  you  've  acted  so 
strangely  to  Father  and  me  and  everybody 
you  used  to  know  ?  " 

I  thought  he  nodded  his  head  at  this  and 
was  encouraged  to  go  on.  "Can't  you 
remember  about  Barbara,  either  ?  She  's 
your  only  sister,  and  she  just  adores  you  — 
oh,  I  know  you  'd  remember  her  if  you 
could  only  see  her." 

He  seemed  about  to  start  crying  again,  but 
sat  up  instead  and  rubbed  his  forehead  as 
though  it  hurt. 

"Here,   take   my   handkerchief   and   go 


192  SERGEANT   JANE 

wash  your  face,"  I  ordered,  and  he  obeyed 
me  like  a  three-year-old.  When  he  came 
back  he  seemed  perfectly  normal  again 
and  painfully  embarrassed. 

"Gee,  Sergeant,  you'll  think  me  an  ass 
and  a  cry-baby  and  worse  than  that,"  he 
stammered.  "This  thing  just  gets  you 
that  way.  You  sure  were  good  to  me." 

"You  poor  boy,"  I  said,  feeling  at  least 
thirty  years  old.  "You  should  have  told 
some  one  long  ago.  I  '11  ask  Father  to 
have  the  doctor  see  you  right  away." 

"Oh,  no,  no,  please,"  he  cried,  growing 
so  white  I  was  frightened  to  death. 
"Please,  please,  don't  tell  any  one. 
Promise  me  you  won't.  I  '11  soon  be  all 
right.  If  you  tell  any  one  I  '11  kill  myself." 

Remembering  that  afternoon  on  the 
wharf,  I  half  believed  him,  but  I  tried  to 
argue  anyhow. 

"Why  won't  you  let  me,  Billy?  It's 
nothing  to  be  ashamed  of,  and  the  doctor 
could  cure  you  in  no  time." 


THE   INEXPLICABLE  MURDOCK    193 

He  would  n't  listen  to  me,  though,  and 
kept  begging  me  not  to  tell  and  talking  so 
wildly  that  I  finally  promised,  much  against 
my  will.  He  seemed  greatly  relieved  and 
jumped  up  almost  cheerfully  when  we  heard 
them  calling  to  us  that  they  were  getting 
ready  to  start. 

I  cuddled  down  in  the  back  of  the  truck 
and  pretended  to  be  sleepy,  so  that  I 
would  n't  have  to  talk  on  the  way  home 
and  could  think  about  Billy.  Why  did  n't 
he  want  any  one  to  know  that  he  had  lost 
his  memory?  Perhaps  that  was  some  sort 
of  mania  resulting  from  the  shock  itself. 
In  that  case  was  n't  it  my  duty  to  tell 
Daddy  in  spite  of  my  promise?  As  if  in 
answer  to  this  last  thought,  I  looked  up  and 
found  Billy's  eyes  fixed  intently  on  mine. 
It  was  only  for  a  second,  and  then  he  turned 
back  to  his  talk  with  Timmons,  but  I  knew 
that  I  would  n't  break  my  promise.  Well, 
it  was  too  much  for  me !  I  yawned  —  and 
must  have  dozed  off,  for  the  next  thing 


194  SERGEANT  JANE 

I  knew  we  were  turning  into  the  Barracks 
driveway. 

I  was  the  last  one  out  of  the  truck,  and 
Billy  was  standing  at  the  side.  "I  was 
lying  to  you,"  he  whispered,  as  he  helped 
me  jump  down.  "I  haven't  lost  my 
memory.  I  never  got  shell-shocked.  Not 
remember  Barbara?  I  remember  every 
yellow  curl  on  her  head  and  every  freckle 
on  her  turned-up  nose.  I  remember  you 
and  all  your  family  just  as  well.  I  lied  to 
you ;  and  I  'm  sorry.  But  you  promised 
not  to  tell,  and  that  promise  still  holds." 

He  climbed  back  into  the  truck,  threw  in 
the  clutch  and  drove  away,  before  I  could 
open  my  mouth  to  question  him.  If  I  had 
thought  him  queer  before,  I  was  sure  now 
that  he  was  crazy. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

I  WRITE  A  LETTER  AND  MAKE  A  BET 

I  WOKE  up  early  the  next  morning  — 
early,  that  is,  for  a  Sunday  —  and  lay 
in  bed  and  thought  about  Billy.     The 
more  I  thought  about  him,  though,  the  more 
unexplainable  it  all  seemed.     If  he  had  n't 
been    shell-shocked,    what    had    been    his 
reason  for  crying  ?     If  he  had  n't  lost  his 
memory,  why  did  he  treat  his  old  friends 
so  queerly  and  refuse  to   talk   about   his 
sister  ? 

Billy  Murdock  was  the  last  person  in  the 
world  I  would  have  expected  to  act  so 
strangely.  He  had  enlisted  just  before  we 
went  to  Norfolk  and  was  one  of  the  first 
men  I  knew  in  Company  D.  Father  had 
been  talking  to  him  one  day  after  drill 


196  SERGEANT   JANE 

when  I  came  running  up  with  a  message, 
and  at  Daddy's  "Well,  Jane,  what  do  you 
think  of  this  new  recruit?"  Billy  turned 
crimson.  He  was  just  eighteen  then  and 
so  anxious  to  make  good  that,  according  to 
his  corporal,  he  even  begged  for  extra  k.  p. 

"There  are  just  two  things  I  'm  really 
crazy  about,"  Bill  had  confided  to  me  one 
day,  after  we  had  known  each  other  for 
several  months.  "One  of  them  is  the 
marines,  of  course,  and  the  other  's  my  kid 
sister." 

Naturally  I  asked  about  his  sister  and 
got  the  story  of  his  life  in  reply  to  my 
question.  His  parents  had  been  killed 
in  a  railroad  accident  when  he  was  about 
six  years  old  and  his  sister  only  a  baby. 
They  had  been  taken  care  of  by  a  rather 
eccentric  uncle,  who  had  plenty  of  money 
but  not  much  affection  to  give  them,  and 
they  had  been  everything  to  each  other. 
Billy's  father  had  been  a  lieutenant  in  the 
marines,  and  the  boy's  dearest  wish  was  to 


I   WRITE  A  LETTER  197 

follow  in  his  footsteps.  But  the  uncle  was 
a  pacifist  and  wanted  him  to  be  a  minister. 
As  soon  as  he  was  eighteen,  Billy  ran  away 
and  enlisted  as  a  private  in  the  marines, 
and  he  was  perfectly  happy  except  that  he 
missed  Barbara  a  great  deal. 

"She  wanted  me  to  do  it,  though,"  he 
had  explained,  "and  she  's  proud  of  me. 
Father  used  to  say  —  it 's  almost  the  only 
thing  I  can  remember  about  him  —  *  Billy, 
there  's  nothing  finer  in  the  whole  round 
world  than  the  right  kind  of  a  marine ;  and 
there  's  nothing  worse  than  a  marine  who 
fails  to  do  his  duty  or  is  disloyal  to  his 
country.  Some  day,  Billy,  you  '11  grow 
up,  and  you  must  never  forget  which  kind 
you  're  going  to  be  —  for  of  course  you  '11 
be  some  kind  of  a  marine.' 

"That 's  what  my  Father  used  to  say  to 
me  over  and  over  again  when  I  was  just 
a  little  shaver.  I  Ve  never  forgotten  it, 
and  I  still  think  it 's  a  great  thing  for  a 
fellow  to  try  to  live  up  to." 


198  SERGEANT  JANE 

And  he  had  gone  off,  whistling,  to  scrub 
down  the  barrack  steps. 

It  was  hard  to  believe  that  this  sullen, 
secretive,  moody  Billy  could  be  the  same 
boy.  Timmons  had  even  told  me,  greatly 
puzzled  himself  at  the  change,  that  Billy 
shirked  his  duties  or  did  them  half- 
heartedly. 

"Hi,  Sister!"  Jimmy's  far  from  gentle 
voice  broke  in  on  my  thoughts.  "Hi, 
Sis  !  Mother  says  to  get  a  wiggle  on  if  you 
want  any  waffles." 

Nothing  was  going  to  come  between  me 
and  a  half-dozen  hot,  crisp,  brown  waffles 
if  I  could  help  it,  so  Murdock  was  hastily 
banished  to  the  backmost  corner  of  my 
brain.  However,  he  was  n't  destined  to 
stay  there  long,  for  we  had  hardly  reached 
our  pew  in  the  little  Episcopal  church  we 
always  attended  before  I  caught  sight  of 
a  familiar  red  head  directly  in  front  of 
me  —  and  I  'm  afraid  my  mind  wandered 
far  away  during  the  sermon. 


I   WRITE  A  LETTER  199 

As  soon  as  dinner  was  over,  I  went  up  to 
my  room,  though  I  had  to  stick  my  fingers 
in  my  ears  to  keep  from  hearing  Timmons' 
tempting  "come  out  for  a  paddle"  whistle. 
I  had  decided  to  write  a  letter,  and  nothing 
was  going  to  stop  me.  I  was  almost  sure 
Billy  was  n't  writing  to  his  sister,  for  Jack 
Blainey,  who  gave  out  the  mail,  had  told  me 
that  he  did  n't  think  Billy  had  received  a 
single  letter  since  he  'd  been  at  St.  Thomas. 
Anyway,  I  meant  to  write  to  Barbara  my- 
self and  find  out.  But  as  I  had  n't  any 
notion  what  the  trouble  was,  I  tore  up 
dozens  of  sheets  of  paper  and  bent  the  point 
of  my  fountain  pen  into  a  regular  fishhook 
before  I  composed  a  letter  that  did  n't  say 
too  much  or  make  me  seem  to  be  butting  in. 

"Dear  Barbara":  I  finally  wrote,  in 
despair  of  doing  any  better.  "I  wonder 
whether  you  remember  me?  When  you 
visited  your  brother  Billy  at  Norfolk,  we 
played  tennis  together  and  I  showed  you 
around  the  Post.  That  was  over  two  years 


200  SERGEANT  JANE 

ago,  and  I  suppose  by  now  you  are  quite 
grown  up  and  would  n't  think  of  swiping 
ginger  cookies  or  sliding  down  the  banis- 
ters the  way  we  did  then. 

"We  have  been  down  here  at  St.  Thomas 
ever  since  last  May  and  like  it  lots.  Father 
is  in  charge  of  the  Post,  and  there  are  about 
twelve  other  officers  and  over  two  hundred 
men  here.  It  was  great  to  find  some  old 
friends  among  them,  especially  your  brother. 
He  seems  older  since  he  's  been  to  war, 
does  n't  he  ?  His  hair  is  as  red  as  ever 
though,  and  he  still  calls  me  Sergeant. 

"We  go  to  a  Convent  School  in  Charlotte 
Amalie,  and  I  shock  the  Sister  sail  the  time  by 
teaching  them  (the  girls,  not  the  teachers)  to 
play  basketball  and  talk  slang,  etc. 

"Are  you  still  at  school  in  Peekskill? 
Please  write  to  me  soon  and  tell  me  all 
about    yourself.     I    have    never    forgotten 
you  and  I  hope  you  have  n't  me. 
"With  love, 

"JANE  SETON  GRAVES." 


I   WRITE  A  LETTER  201 

I  put'  the  address  at  the  bottom  in  big, 
black  letters,  so  she  would  be  sure  to  see  it, 
for  I  thought  she  might  want  to  know  more 
about  Billy  right  away. 

After  hunting  for  half  an  hour  in  my  desk 
and  bureau  drawers  for  my  address  book, 
I  finally  found  it  wrapped  in  a  red  middy 
tie  in  a  box  in  the  top  of  the  closet.  (There 
are  some  advantages  in  being  a  perfect  lady, 
though  I  will  never  admit  it  in  public.) 
Then  I  addressed  and  sealed  the  envelope 
and  took  it  over  to  go  with  the  barracks' 
mail. 

I  tried  to  find  Timmons  but  could  n't, 
and  my  family  were  all  too  lazy  to  move 
from  the  porch,  where  they  were  gossiping 
with  the  Hunters,  so  I  went  down  to  the 
wharf  by  myself,  feeling  comfortably 
virtuous  because  the  letter  was  finished 
and  planning  to  reward  myself  with  a  nice 
long  paddle.  I  never  thought  much  of 
that  proverb  about  virtue  being  its  own 
reward,  so  I  was  n't  a  bit  pleased  when 


202  SERGEANT   JANE 

I  was  informed  by  various  members  of 
the  Sunday-afternoon  loafing  club  that 
Timmons  had  taken  the  Sweetheart  and 
a  couple  of  cronies  and  departed  in  the 
general  direction  of  the  inlet  shortly  after 
dinner. 

"Doggone  the  luck,"  I  muttered  crossly, 
sitting  down  on  one  of  the  pilings  and 
sticking  my  hands  into  the  pockets  of  my 
yellow  sweater.  "Ever  since  he  made  that 
canoe,  I  Ve  been  begging  him  to  use  it  him- 
self, and  he  never  would  until  just  the  day 
I  wanted  it  most.  Drat  him!" 

"Wai,  Sergeant,"  drawled  Tim  Thomp- 
son, a  plump,  bow-legged  little  Yankee, 
"I  'm  afraid  there  's  not  a  blooming  boat 
left  in  this  harbor.  My  own  palatial  yacht 
is  laid  up  in  the  dry  dock  for  repairs."  He 
pointed  dramatically  to  a  lop-sided,  flat- 
bottomed,  paintless  row-boat  drawn  up  on 
the  beach. 

"What  *s  the  matter  with  her?"  I  asked, 
for  she  looked  as  solid  and  unsinkable  as  ever. 


I   WRITE  A  LETTER  203 

"She  leaks!"  Antonino  chimed  in,  shak- 
ing his  head  dolefully.  "The  lufly 
and  bee-yu-ti-ful  Lily-uf-the-Valley  has 
springed  a  nawful  leak." 

" Lily-of -the- Valley  !"  I  cried  in  astonish- 
ment. "Why,  I  thought  her  name  was 
Mudhen." 

"It  was,  Sergeant,  it  was."  Corporal 
McGraw  rose  to  his  full  six  feet  of  manly 
beauty  the  better  to  explain.  "We  used 
to  insult  her  by  that  unkind  name.  We 
blush  to  think  of  it  now,  don't  we,  boys? 
(Blush,  dingbust  you,  blush.  You  're  a 
fine  lot  of  illustrations.)  But  the  Reverend 
Kenyon  gave  us  a  most  inspirational  talk 
on  the  beeyutifulness  of  everyday  things, 
and  we  came  to  see  the  error  of  our  ways. 
He  says  to  us,  says  he,  'If  you  think  a 
thing  is  beautiful,  it  becomes  so.' 

"'Tres  been,'  say  we,  'we  '11  think  of  the 
Mudhen  as  a  beeyutiful  yacht,  all  white 
decks  and  shining  brasses  and  hundred- 
horse-power  engines.'  To  help  the  idea 


204  SERGEANT  JANE 

along,  we  baptized  her  over  again  with  the 
more  fitting  appel  —  appalachian  —  of  Lily- 
of-the-Valley.  Then  we  went  for  a  sail  in 
our  new  yacht." 

"Well,"  I  laughed.     "What  then?" 

"Why,  then,"  Tim  took  up  the  tale, 
"seeing  that  she  was  now  a  high-class 
pleasure  boat,  she  proceeded  to  act  as  such ; 
which  is  to  say — " 

"She  springed  a  leak  —  a  nawful  leak," 
Antonino  concluded. 

Then  they  all  three  turned  down  the 
corners  of  their  mouths  and  frowned  at  me 
coldly,  because  I  could  n't  stop  laughing. 

"That 's  a  great  idea  about  ugly  things 
looking  beautiful  if  you  think  'em  that  way," 
I  remarked  hastily,  not  wanting  the  con- 
versation to  die  away  just  yet.  "Maybe 
I  could  apply  it  to  Sister  Agatha." 

"Who  's  she?"  inquired  McGraw,  allow- 
ing a  twinkle  to  creep  into  his  disapproving 
stare. 

"One  of  the  teachers  at  school.     She  's  an 


I  WRITE  A  LETTER  205 

awful  crank  and  looks  as  though  she  's  been 
left  out  all  night  in  the  rain." 

"That 's  a  fine  way  to  speak  of  your 
elders  and  betters,"  drawled  Tim,  languidly 
scratching  a  match  on  the  sole  of  his  shoe. 
"She  's  no  doubt  an  estimable  woman  — " 

"Has  a  strong  face,  means  well,  and  is 
good  to  her  mother,"  interrupted  McGraw. 
"  She 's  settled.  Say  though,  Sergeant, 
what  kind  of  girls  do  you  have  at  this 
school  of  yours?  I  saw  a  bunch  of  them 
in  town  the  other  day,  and  they  looked  like 
regular  doll-baby  sissies." 

"They  're  no  such  thing.  They  're 
dandy  girls.  I  think  you  're  mighty  rude 
to  talk  that  way,"  I  spluttered  indignantly. 

"Beg  your  pardon;  beg  your  pardon. 
I  did  n't  mean  that  they  were  n't  attractive 
and  agreeable  and  all  that.  I  just  thought 
they  did  n't  seem  much  your  sort  —  not 
enough  pep." 

"Pep!  Huh!  You  ought  to  see  some  of 
our  basketball  games." 


206  SERGEANT  JANE 

"I  'm  willing.     Lead  me  to  them." 

"I  don't  believe  they  would  let  you 
watch  us  at  the  school.  The  Sisters  are 
awfully  particular  and  get  shocked  at 
everything." 

"Well,  then,  bring  them  over  here. 
What 's  the  matter  with  our  field  ?  I 
tell  you  what  —  bring  'em  over  and  we  '11 
play  'em.  Then  we  '11  see  who's  got  the 
pep." 

"Oh,  McGraw,  we  could  n't  do  that !" 

"Scared  to,  are  you?  I  might  have 
known." 

"I'm  not." 

"You  are." 

"  Here !  Here !  Wait  a  minute !  Stop ! 
Don't  get  excited!"  Tim  and  Antonino, 
up  till  now  a  silent  audience,  were  anxious 
to  keep  the  peace. 

"Keep  your  hats  on,"  Tim  implored, 
grabbing  me  by  the  skirt,  for  I  had  jumped 
up  and  started  toward  McGraw.  "  What'd 
you  want  to  tease  her  for,  you  big  stiff? 


I   WRITE  A  LETTER  207 

She 's  got  enough  red  in  her  hair  to  warn 
you  off." 

"All  right,"  said  McGraw.  "I  was  only 
joking.  You  did  n't  suppose  I  really 
thought  those  girls  would  have  nerve 
enough  to  do  it." 

"What '11  you  bet  they  haven't?"  I 
demanded  professionally,  jumping  up  again 
as  soon  as  Tim  let  go  of  my  skirt.  "  I  '11 
take  you  up  for  any  amount." 

McGraw  looked  surprised,  mumbled 
something  about  not  betting  on  a  sure 
thing  and  then  offered,  "Two  to  one  on 
anything  you  say." 

"  Well,"  I  decided  after  thinking  a  minute, 
"if  they  don't  play,  I'll  buy  you  a  dozen 
packages  of  cigarettes;  and  if  they  do, 
you  '11  buy  every  girl  on  the  team  a  box  of 
candy." 

"It's  a  go,"  he  agreed.  "Gee,  I  wish 
they  would  really  do  it.  It  would  be  some 
sport." 

"They   really   will;    don't  worry  about 


208  SERGEANT  JANE 

that,"  I  assured  him.  "You  '11  have  to 
play  according  to  our  rules  though,  or  it 
would  be  too  easy  for  you." 

"Make  the  men  all  wear  skirts,  too," 
Tim  suggested. 

"Let  us  be  the  yumpires?"  Antonino 
begged.  "  When  is  this  game  to  come  off  ?  " 

"Friday  afternoon,"  I  decided.  "We 
get  out  at  three-thirty  and  don't  play  at 
school  on  Fridays.  You  'd  better  begin 
saving  up  your  money  for  the  candy, 
McGraw." 

"I  'm  not  worrying,"  he  called  after  me, 
as  I  started  up  to  the  house.  "  You  have  n't 
any  team  yet." 


CHAPTER  XV 


I  NEVER  used  to  be  superstitious.     In 
fact  I  had  n't  much  use  for  people  who 
were.     But  now  I  know  that  there  is 
something  queer  about  Fridays,  and  I  treat 
them  with  caution.     So  would  you,  if  you 
had  lived  through  one  such  sixth  day  in  the 
week  as  I  did. 

Things  began  to  go  wrong  from  the 
start.  I  could  n't  find  my  Spanish  book 
and  was  late  for  school.  When  we  went 
in  for  morning  exercises,  Sister  Agatha 
announced  that  Sister  Thecla  was  ill  and 
that  she  would  therefore  lead  the  prayers. 

Madelon  and  I  were  on  the  back  row, 
because  of  my  lateness,  and  we  got  through 
the  first  hymn  serenely.  Then  came 


210  SERGEANT  JANE 

prayers,  and  according  to  the  custom  of  the 
school,  we  knelt  on  the  floor  with  our  hands 
clasped  on  the  back  of  the  bench  in  front  of 
us.  The  wooden  backs  came  down  to  the 
seats  only  at  the  ends;  in  between  was 
an  opening  about  six  inches  wide. 
Sister  Agatha's  voice  droned  on  and  on 
until  my  knees  ached  and  my  back  refused 
to  stay  up  straight  another  instant. 

"I  dare  you  to  stick  your  head  through, 
Jean  Graves,"  Madelon  whispered,  when 
from  sheer  exhaustion  we  had  sunk  down 
and  were  sitting  on  our  legs. 

But  I  was  n't  so  easily  tempted. 

"Double  dare,"  she  whispered  again. 

Of  course  nobody  ever  refuses  a  double 
dare,  so  I  turned  my  head  sideways  and 
stuck  it  through  the  opening  in  the  bench 
in  front  of  me.  Madelon  was  only  a 
second  behind  me  and  had  turned  in  the 
opposite  direction  so  that  we  faced  each 
other. 

"Prisoners  in  the  stocks,"  she  giggled. 


A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  211 

"Amen!"  boomed  a  distant  voice,  and 
scrambling  sounds  began  as  the  school  rose 
to  its  feet.  I  hastily  withdrew  my  head 
—  as  far  as  the  ears.  Farther  it  would  n't 
go.  Either  the  opening  had  shrunk,  or 
my  brain  had  unaccountably  expanded.  I 
twisted  and  tugged,  —  and  stayed  where 
I  was. 

"Madelon,  I  'm  stuck,"  I  gasped,  but 
I  could  no  longer  see  anything  of  my  side- 
partner  except  her  shoes.  Her  head  had 
not  grown  larger  while  she  knelt. 

Every  one  was  standing  by  this  time  and, 
although  Madelon  explained  afterward  that 
she  tried  her  best  to  hide  me  with  her  skirt, 
the  rest  of  the  row  had  discovered  my 
plight.  Being  girls,  they  giggled,  mildly  at 
first  and  then,  as  more  and  more  of  them 
caught  on  and  turned  to  stare,  so  loudly  that 
the  whole  room  was  in  an  uproar.  Sister 
Agatha's  voice,  cold  and  angry,  came 
vaguely  to  my  ears,  but  I  was  too  much 
embarrassed  and  too  busy  to  pay  much 


212  SERGEANT  JANE 

attention  to  it.  Madelon  and  several  other 
girls  had  come  to  my  assistance  and  were 
trying,  between  fits  of  laughter,  to  get  me 
out. 

"Slide  down  till  you  come  to  a  wider 
place." 

"Turn  on  the  other  side." 

"Pull  harder." 

"Turn  on  your  back." 

I  tried  to  follow  everybody's  advice  at 
once  and  just  stuck  the  tighter.  "Tilt 
the  darn  bench,  you  bloomin*  idiot,"  I 
shouted,  —  and  looked  up  (being  prac- 
tically on  my  back  by  this  time)  into  the 
stony  countenance  of  Sister  Agatha. 

Of  course  my  head  slipped  out  quite 
easily  as  soon  as  she  took  charge,  and  she 
refused  to  believe  that  I  had  not  done  the 
whole  thing  on  purpose.  After  it  was  all 
over,  I  went  into  sewing  with,  the  others 
and  Martha  whispered,  giggling,  "Got  a 
lecture  for  being  too  pious,  didn't  you?" 

If  she  had  n't  been  so  lacking  in  sisterly 


A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  213 

sympathy,  I  might  have  felt  worse  about 
what  happened  later.  As  it  was,  I  could  n't 
help  laughing,  although  I  did  feel  sorry  for 
her. 

In  the  middle  of  the  sewing  period  Sister 
Agatha  suddenly  darted  from  the  table 
where  she  had  been  cutting  out  wash  bags 
and  swooped  down  on  one  of  the  side  aisles. 

"A  note!"  she  cried,  straightening  up, 
with  a  piece  of  white  paper  in  her  hand. 
"A  note !"  It  sounded  as  though  she  were 
saying  a  bomb,  or  a  dagger,  or  a  snake,  and 
the  room  grew  deathly  still. 

She  deliberately  opened  the  note  and 
read  it  through  slowly  before  she  spoke. 
"Will  the  young  lady  who  wrote  this  — 
this  missive  kindly  stand  up,"  she  ordered 
in  her  severest  tones. 

Martha  rose  to  her  feet,  blushing 
violently.  "I  wrote  it,"  she  acknowledged. 

Sister  Agatha  seemed  a  trifle  disconcerted. 
I  think  she  had  been  hoping  I  would  prove 
to  be  the  culprit.  Then  she  evidently 


214  SERGEANT  JANE 

decided  that  it  was  all  in  the  family,  any- 
way, so  she  might  as  well  make  the  best  of  it. 

"This  is  an  unheard-of  occurrence,"  she 
declared,  glaring  at  poor  Martha  as  though 
she  would  like  to  eat  her.  "Such  a  thing 
has  never  happened  in  this  school  before. 
None  of  our  girls  would  be  so  dishonorable 
as  to  pass  a  note.  I  am  — " 

Therese  was  waving  her  hand  so  fran- 
tically that  Sister  Agatha  was  forced  to 
acknowledge  it. 

"Martha's  not  the  only  one  who  passes 
notes,"  the  French  girl  declared  hotly. 
"We  all  do  —  and  I  don't  see  anything 
dishonorable  about  it." 

"Lots  of  us  pass  notes."  "Of  course  we 
do  — "  Several  others  chimed  in,  and 
Sister  Agatha  was  obliged  to  change  her 
method  of  attack. 

"In  that  case,  since  there  was  no  inten- 
tion of  secrecy  or  underhandedness,"  she 
informed  the  class,  "Martha  will  be  glad 
to  share  the  contents  of  the  note  with  us. 


A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  215 

Go  to  the  front  of  the  room,  Martha,  and 
read  it  out  loud." 

"Oh,  no,  please,"  Martha  begged,  on  the 
verge  of  tears.  "Please  don't  make  me 
do  that." 

But  Sister  Agatha  put  the  note  into  her 
hands,  pushed  her  up  the  aisle  and  stood 
over  her  while  she  read. 

"Oh,  T.,"  she  began,  blushing  harder 
than  ever,  "I  'm  so  glad  I  'm  going  to 
spend  the  week-end  with  you.  I  hope  J. 
can  go  on  the  picnic.  He  has  the  most 
wonderful  eyes  (oh,  please,  Sister  Agatha, 
don't  make  me  read  it !)  —  and  thrills  me 
to  death  when  he  looks  at  me  you  know 
how.  (I  can 't  read  any  more  —  I  can't.) 
I  told  you  what  W.  said  about  your  being 
different  from  any  one  else  in  the  world  and 
all  that,  so  don't  forget  your  promise  about 
J.  and  P." 

She  finished  all  in  one  breath  at  full 
speed,  tore  the  fatal  paper  into  a  thousand 
bits  and  stalked  back  to  her  seat  with  her 


216  SERGEANT  JANE 

head  high  in  the  air.  I  had  to  admit  that 
she  was  plucky  and  that  I  could  never  have 
gone  through  with  it  as  well,  for  the  class 
was  roaring  and  Therese  had  turned  every 
color  of  the  rainbow.  But  then  there 
was  n't  much  danger  of  my  getting  into 
trouble  by  writing  slushy  notes. 

There  were  plenty  of  other  ways  to  get 
there,  though,  as  I  soon  discovered.  After 
school  Martha  came  out  from  an  interview 
with  Sister  Agatha,  with  her  chin  still 
pointing  skyward,  and  departed  with 
Therese  for  her  week-end  at  La  Patrie. 
Then  Mary  Deane,  Madelon,  Christine 
Dann,  Anna  Larkin,  Rose  Chattam  and 
I  put  on  our  bloomers  under  our  skirts, 
thinking  that  the  best  way  to  smuggle 
them  past  Sister  Agatha,  and  set  out  for  the 
barracks.  These  were  n't  our  best  basket- 
ball players  —  in  fact,  Anna  was  about  the 
worst  —  but  they  were  the  only  ones  who 
had  had  the  afternoon  free  and  been  good 
enough  sports  to  volunteer. 


A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  217 

The  court  was  freshly  marked  and  rolled, 
we  discovered  when  we  reached  it,  and 
practically  all  the  men  not  on  the  team  or 
on  duty  that  afternoon  were  lined  up  along 
the  side  lines.  We  went  into  the  house  to 
take  off  our  skirts  and  put  on  middy 
blouses,  and  I  found  that  Mother  and  Dad 
had  gone  out  for  a  ride.  I  had  decided  not 
to  tell  them  about  the  game  until  the  last 
minute,  just  in  case  they  should  object, 
though  I  really  did  n't  expect  them  to,  so 
I  was  n't  broken-hearted  at  their  absence. 

The  men  cheered  when  we  marched  on 
to  the  field,  but  the  real  noise  came  when 
the  marine  team  lockstepped  out  from  the 
barracks,  ribbons  flying  in  the  breeze, 
picture  hats  flopping  and  skirts  of  all 
lengths  and  colors  over  their  uniforms. 
I  could  n't  imagine  where  they  had  col- 
lected so  many  clothes  in  that  womanless 
Post  until  I  recognized  an  old  green  silk 
petticoat  of  mine,  which  came  just  to 
McGraw's  knees  and  made  him  look  like 


218  SERGEANT  JANE 

an  overgrown  ballet  dancer.  Then  I  spotted 
other  loot  from  our  storeroom  and  from 
Mrs.  Hunter's,  and  I  began  to  suspect  that 
Jimmy  had  n't  been  far  away  when  the 
team  costumed  itself. 

They  were  all  gotten  up  in  most  fearful 
and  wonderful  style,  but  Shorty  Davis,  the 
diminutive  side-center,  took  the  prize,  hob- 
bling around  in  the  black  satin  evening 
dress  I  had  worn  to  the  New  Year's 
f£te,  with  a  bright  green  sash  draped  over 
one  shoulder  and  a  gold-lace  boudoir  cap 
perched  on  top  of  a  row  of  red-woolen  curls. 

McGraw  pirouetted  gracefully  to  my  side 
and  saluted.  "At  your  service,  Sergeant," 
he  piped  in  a  would-be  feminine  voice. 

"Do  I  win  my  bet?"  I  demanded. 

"You  do  —  after  you've  played." 

So  I  explained  the  rules,  more  or  less, 
while  the  players  listened  a  little  and  the 
umpires  not  at  all,  and  then  the  teams 
lined  up  for  the  whistle,  which  was  the 
dinner  gong  in  Antonino's  practised  hands. 


A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  219 

The  men  thought  that  of  course  they 
would  just  have  to  pretend  to  play,  but 
when  we  plunked  the  ball  in  the  basket 
three  times  in  the  first  five  minutes,  they 
began  to  wake  up  and  realize  that  with 
skirts  and  girls'  rules  and  Tony  calling 
rounds  every  few  minutes  because  he  was 
more  used  to  prize-fighting  than  basket- 
ball, it  was  n't  going  to  be  so  easy  to  beat 
us.  Their  best  chance  came  when  our 
entire  team  collapsed  in  a  fit  of  giggles  at 
the  sight  of  Shorty  Davis,  having  given  up 
all  attempts  at  separating  his  feet  far 
enough  to  run,  moving  about  by  hops  and 
broad  jumps,  at  each  of  which  he  shed  one 
of  his  crimson  curls. 

The  audience  howled  and  shrieked  ad- 
vice to  their  team  of  ladies  and  applauded 
both  sides  with  equal  enthusiasm  whenever 
a  goal  was  made.  The  score  was  a  tie,  — 
eight  to  eight.  Shorty  had  just  tripped 
over  his  own  feet  and  fallen  headfirst  into 
his  boudoir  cap ;  Anna  Larkin,  her  face 


220  SERGEANT  JANE 

scarlet  and  her  mouth  wide  open,  had  her 
arms  firmly  clasped  round  McGraw's  green 
petticoat  in  a  hopeless  effort  to  stop  him 
in  a  dash  across  center;  Madelon  and  the 
forward  she  was  guarding  were  having 
what  seemed  to  be  a  tug-of-war  with 
the  latter's  straw  hat;  and  I  was  lying 
flat  on  my  back  with  the  ball  in  my  arms 
and  Lyman  standing  over  me,  waiting 
for  me  to  get  up  —  when  the  howls  of 
the  audience  abruptly  ceased,  the  players 
stopped  as  if  frozen  in  their  tracks,  and 
Lyman,  backing  away  from  me,  cried  to 
high  heaven,  "Holy  Cats!  Look  who's 
here!" 

I  jumped  to  my  feet  and  stared  at  the 
driveway.  Then  I  rubbed  my  eyes  and 
stared  again.  But  the  dilapidated  buggy 
and  the  white  horse  refused  to  disappear, 
and  the  two  black-gowned  figures  in  the 
front  seat  of  the  buggy  were  only  too 
familiar.  For  the  first  time  in  history, 
Sisters  from  the  Holy  Cross  Convent  were 


A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  221 

paying  a  visit  to  the  Marine  Barracks,  and 
one  of  them,  of  course,  was  named  Agatha. 

Is  it  any  wonder  that  I  have  lost  my 
fondness  for  Fridays?  As  it  turned  out, 
though,  things  might  have  been  worse. 
Sister  Agatha  had  been  coming  to  tell 
Mother  about  Martha's  note-passing  pro- 
clivities, but  the  sight  she  saw  on  the  way 
almost  put  that  minor  offense  out  of  her 
mind.  Mother  and  Dad  drove  up  while 
the  buggy  was  still  keeping  the  basketball 
game  in  a  state  of  suspended  animation. 
Explanations  and  expressions  of  opinion 
followed,  and  in  due  course  an  armistice 
was  signed  and  certain  terms  of  peace  were 
imposed. 

Jimmy,  as  usual,  managed  to  get  some- 
thing to  his  advantage  out  of  the  rumpus. 
As  a  concession  to  Sister  Agatha's  feelings, 
Mother  had  promised  to  send  her  two  way- 
ward daughters  to  their  rooms  immediately 
after  supper  for  a  week.  When  we  meekly 
trotted  up  the  stairs  on  Monday  evening, 


222  SERGEANT  JANE 

we  found  that  our  small  brother  had  already 
retired  and  locked  both  of  his  doors. 

"Jimmy,"  Martha  suggested  sweetly, 
"wouldn't  you  like  us  to  come  in  and 
watch  the  moving  pictures  with  you?" 

"Nothin*  doin',"  he  answered  briefly 
and  to  the  point. 

"Drat  the  child,"  said  Martha,  not  so 
sweetly.  "Can't  we  possibly  see  them 
from  your  room,  Jane?  " 

"  Only  half  the  sheet,"  I  lamented.  "  The 
chimney  cuts  off  the  rest." 

So  we  stooped  to  bargaining.  "What 
do  you  want  to  let  us  in  ?  "  I  shouted  through 
the  keyhole. 

"A  nickel  apiece,"  decreed  the  lord  of 
our  fate,  without  a  moment's  hesitation. 

"Might  as  well  fork  it  out,  had  n't  we?" 
Martha  asked,  and  I  nodded.  A  minute 
later  we  stuck  our  five-cent  pieces  under  the 
door. 

"That 's  not  enough,"  the  child  profiteer 
announced  coldly. 


A  SCRAP  OF  PAPER  223 

"You  said  a  nickel,  Jimmy  Graves," 
Martha  replied  indignantly. 

"Yes,  but  you  forgot  the  two  centh  war 
takth,"  he  lisped  gently  but  firmly.  "It 's 
theven  thenth  a  night,  but  I  might  make 
thpecial  rateth  by  the  week." 

When  I  told  Daddy  about  it,  he  said  that 
if  none  of  Jimmy's  other  careers  panned 
out,  he  could  always  be  sure  of  a  success 
in  high  finance. 


V 


CHAPTER  XVI 

A  VISIT  FROM  THE  COMMISSION 

"T    T   URRY     UP>     Jinks!"     Father 

I 1     shouted  up  the  stairs  one  after- 

•*•  •*•  noon  early  in  April.  "The 
boat 's  almost  in,  and  it  would  never  do 
to  keep  their  royal  commissionerships 
waiting." 

"Coming  right  away,"  I  called  back,  as 
I  pulled  my  floppy  Chachas  hat  over  my 
eyes  and  took  a  parting  look  in  the  mirror 
to  see  if  I  were  really  as  sunburned  as  my 
white  organdie  dress  made  me  look. 

The  rest  of  the  family  were  already  in 
the  car,  with  the  Major  and  Captain  and 
Mrs.  Hunter.  A  khaki-colored  squad  was 
just  disappearing  down  the  road  to  town,  and 
four  motorcyclists  were  waiting  to  escort  us. 


A  VISIT  FROM  THE   COMMISSION     225 

"I  feel  like  a  bloomin'  parade,"  Jimmy 
cried  excitedly,  as  the  car  snorted  and 
plunged  forward. 

"Well,  it 's  not  every  day  we  're  honored 
by  the  visit  of  a  sure-enough  guaranteed 
genuine  committee  from  the  States,  bent  on 
investigating  and  improving  our  modest 
little  island,"  the  Major  replied,  with  a 
twinkle  in  his  eye. 

"I  don't  think  we  need  improving," 
Jimmy  declared  loyally.  "But  I  'm  glad 
they  're  coming,  'cause  there 's  to  be  a 
parade  drill  and  all  sorts  of  big  eats." 

The  gangplank  was  being  lowered  as  we 
reached  the  dock,  and  the  marines  were 
lined  up  at  attention  on  either  side. 
Father  and  the  other  officers  took  their 
places  at  the  heads  of  the  columns,  and 
Mother  stayed  in  the  car,  but  we  slipped 
out,  having  been  forewarned  not  to  expect 
a  ride  home,  and  pushed  as  near  the  front 
of  the  crowd  as  we  could. 

A  number  of   deckhands   hurried  down 


226  SERGEANT  JANE 

the  plank  and  helped  the  men  on  the 
wharf  make  it  fast.  Then  came  a  dozen 
marines  and  as  many  sailors,  and  after 
them  five  portly  gentlemen,  who  would 
have  looked  more  natural  in  frock  coats 
and  high  hats  than  they  did  in  white  drill 
and  Panamas. 

"Gee,  they  all  look  like  twins,"  whis- 
pered Jimmy.  "Here 's  some  more 
marines  and  —  Sis,  look  quick  at  Billy 
Murdock.  What 's  he  doing?" 

I  saw  him  immediately  and  stared  in 
surprise.  He  had  slipped  away  from  his 
place  in  the  rear  line  and  was  talking 
rapidly  to  a  blond,  sullen-looking  deck- 
hand, whose  shoulders  he  grasped  tightly 
with  both  hands. 

Lieutenant  Porter  had  evidently  noticed 
the  tableau  at  the  same  instant.  "Mur- 
dock," he  commanded,  "get  back  into  line." 

Billy  did  n't  pay  the  slightest  attention. 
He  was  shaking  the  deck  hand  now  and 
seemed  to  be  asking  questions  to  which  he 


A  VISIT   FROM   THE   COMMISSION     227 

could  get  no  answers.  The  commissioners 
and  officers  were  exchanging  greetings  and 
compliments  so  noisily  that  we  could  n't 
hear  a  word  he  was  saying. 

We  saw  Lieutenant  Porter  stride  over 
to  Murdock  and,  white  with  anger,  order 
him  once  more  to  get  back  to  his  place. 
Murdock,  turning  a  minute  from  his 
victim,  shook  his  head  stubbornly,  and 
when  the  lieutenant  tried  to  take  him  by 
the  arm,  shook  himself  free  and  gave  that 
astonished  officer  a  hearty  shove  in  the  ribs. 

Jimmy  looked  at  me  in  open-mouthed 
amazement,  and  I  could  only  stare  stupidly 
back.  In  another  minute  two  of  the  men 
had  Murdock  by  the  arms,  and  under 
Lieutenant  Porter's  commands  were 
marching  him  up  the  road  in  the  dust  of 
the  slowly-moving  car. 

"Well,  I'll  be  jelly-jashed-jammed!" 
Jimmy  always  invented  new  expressions 
in  moments  of  greatest  excitement. 
"What  ever  hath  got  into  old  Murdock?" 


228  SERGEANT  JANE 

"What  do  you  suppose  it  was  all 
about?"  Martha  inquired,  gazing  in  be- 
wilderment up  the  dusty  road.  "They  '11 
put  him  in  the  fortress  for  disobeying 
Lieutenant  Porter,  I  suppose.  Well,  he 
surely  deserved  it ! " 

"There  must  have  been  some  reason  for 
his  doing  it,"  I  temporized.  Somehow  I 
could  n't  help  wanting  to  stand  up  for 
Billy,  even  though  he  had  acted  so  queerly 
ever  since  we  had  been  at  St.  Thomas. 

"Let 's  talk  to  that  old  boy,"  Jimmy 
suggested,  pointing  to  the  deckhand,  who 
was  still  standing  where  Murdock  ,  had 
left  him,  a  dazed  look  on  his  face  and  his 
hands  stuck  deep  in  his  overall  pockets. 

Jimmy,  being  the  only  man  in  the  party, 
took  the  lead. 

"What  did  Murdock  say  to  you,  and 
what 's  your  name?"  he  demanded,  plant- 
ing himself  squarely  in  front  of  the  stranger. 

The  man  eyed  him  sullenly. 

"I    don't    know    vat    he    vanted,"    he 


A  VISIT  FROM  THE  COMMISSION    229 

muttered  finally.  "  I  nefer  saw  him  before. 
I  think  he  iss  crazy." 

"Why,  you're  German!'*  I  exclaimed. 
"What 's  your  name?" 

"I  am  nod  German.  I  am  Swees.  My 
name  iss  Frangois  Javal." 

"All  right,  Frangois,"  I  agreed  hastily, 
for  he  was  glaring  at  me  in  a  far  from 
friendly  manner.  "Anything  you  say! 
Do  you  work  on  this  boat  ?  " 

"Yess,"  he  replied  shortly  and  turned 
his  back  on  us  to  indicate  that  the  con- 
versation was  ended. 

We  tried  to  make  him  tell  us  something 
about  his  meeting  with  Murdock,  but  he 
refused  to  say  another  word,  and  we  finally 
gave  him  up  in  despair  and  started  home, 
puzzling  our  brains  for  some  explanation 
of  Billy's  behavior. 

There  was  a  big  dinner  at  the  barracks 
that  night  hi  honor  of  the  Commissioners, 
and  we  hung  around  in  the  court,  waiting 
for  the  moving  pictures  to  begin  and 


230  SERGEANT   JANE 

getting  away  with  several  pints  of  choco- 
late ice  cream  that  Tony  sneaked  out  to  us. 
I  was  anxious  for  some  news  about  Billy 
and  walked  down  to  the  fort  when  the 
men  went  to  change  guard. 

Timmons  was  coming  off  duty,  and  I 
tried  to  pump  him,  but  he  said  that  all 
he  knew  was  that  Murdock  had  been 
locked  up  and  would  be  court-martialed 
to-morrow  or  the  next  day,  and  that  he 
refused  to  say  a  word. 

"Nuts,  if  you  ask  me,"  the  old  sergeant 
remarked,  tapping  his  head.  "It  looks 
sort  of  bad  for  him,  seein's  how  the  Lieut, 
is  consid'rable  het  up  at  the  insult  to  his 
dignity,  and  besides,  they  've  been  and 
found  out  that  there  rope-hauler  Murdock 
was  so  set  on  confabbing  with  is  a  Boche." 

"I  thought  he  was  !"  I  cried.  "How  did 
he  ever  happen  to  be  on  that  English 
steamship?'* 

"Well,  I  don't  rightly  know,  Miss  Jane. 
But  they  say  they  were  short-handed  up  to 


A  VISIT   FROM   THE   COMMISSION     231 

Porto  Rico  and  took  on  some  extra  hands. 
That 's  just  what  they  say,  mind  you ;  I 
don'  know  no  thin'." 

"What  else  do  they  say,  Timmons?"  I 
asked,  knowing  that  this  was  the  only 
way  to  get  any  information  from  him. 

"Well,  of  course  I  don'  know  how  much 
truth  there  is  in  it,"  he  hinted  cautiously. 
"As  I  hears  it,  the  name  of  this  Boche  is 
Franz  Zeitler,  and  he 's  got  some  relatives 
living  on  this  here  island." 

"  He  has  ?    How  do  you  know  ?  " 

"I  don'  know,"  he  corrected  me  sternly. 
"I  don'  know  nothin'  about  it  at  all. 
I  'm  just  tellin'  you  that  they  said  he  was 
followed  when  he  went  off  on  shore  leave 
late  this  afternoon,  and  he  went  to  a 
certain  house  —  I'm  not  knowing  where, 
mind  you  —  and  talked  a  lot  of  Boche 
talk  to  the  people  in  it  and  acted  like  a 
reg'lar  fam'ly  reunion." 

"And  what  do  they  say  about  Murdock 
talking  to  him?"  I  prompted. 


232  SERGEANT   JANE 

But  Timmons  refused  to  part  with  any 
more  information  and  made  off  abruptly 
for  the  mess  room. 

Jimmy  had  saved  a  seat  for  me,  and  I 
told  him  all  I  had  been  able  to  find  out. 

"I  don't  see  that  it  explains  anything, 
though,  do  you?"  I  asked,  when  I  had 
finished  the  little  I  knew  of  Franz's  auto- 
biography. "If  Billy  had  any  dealings 
with  that  old  German,  he  would  n't  rush  up 
to  him  in  front  of  the  whole  company  and 
officers  and  commissioners  and  the  rest  of 
the  mob  on  that  wharf,  would  he?" 

"I  '11  think  about  it,"  Jimmy  offered 
graciously  and  turned  his  entire  attention 
to  the  cowboys  on  the  screen. 

The  next  morning  there  was  a  big  drill 
in  the  parade  grounds,  with  lots  of  special 
marching  and  firing  of  cannons  and  polite 
compliments  by  the  visitors.  In  the  after- 
noon, following  an  official  luncheon  in 
town,  there  was  an  athletic  carnival  hi 
Emancipation  Park.  The  little  Spicks 


A  VISIT  FROM  THE  COMMISSION    233 

from  the  public  school  paraded  and  danced 
and  sang  songs.  They  were  every  shade 
from  the  inkiest  black  to  pale  tan,  and 
they  all  wore  white  and  carried  American 
flags.  They  were  so  solemn  about  it  all 
and  tried  so  hard  to  keep  in  step  and  in 
time  with  the  band,  that  they  made  a  hit 
with  everybody.  Then  our  school  teams 
played  an  exhibition  basketball  game. 
The  Sisters  had  gotten  so  used  to  seeing  us 
in  bloomers  that  they  did  n't  object  at  all 
when  Father  asked  their  permission,  and 
even  though  most  of  the  town  people  had 
no  idea  what  it  was  all  about,  they  cheered 
and  clapped  and  seemed  to  enjoy  it  almost 
as  much  as  the  marines  did. 

I  had  decided  to  ask  Father's  permission 
to  talk  to  Billy,  but  as  a  result  of  all  the 
festivities,  I  did  n't  have  a  chance  to  see 
him  alone  until  after  supper  that  evening, 
when  the  Commissioners  had  gone  back 
to  their  hotel  to  rest  up  for  a  long  motor 
trip  the  next  morning.  And  then  when  I 


234  SERGEANT  JANE 

told  him  what  I  wanted  to  do,  he  flatly 
refused  to  let  me. 

"But,  Dad,"  I  protested,  "I  know 
there 's  something  to  be  said  on  Billy's 
side,  and  maybe  he  will  talk  to  me." 

"Possibly,"  Father  replied,  squinting 
into  the  stem  of  his  pipe  with  a  worried 
expression.  "Just  at  present,  however, 
Murdock  is  under  guard  for  breaking  ranks, 
engaging  in  conversation,  which  he  refuses 
to  explain,  with  a  German  deckhand,  dis- 
obeying and  —  er  —  shoving  an  officer.  I 
can  see  no  possible  reason  for  waiving  regu- 
lations to  let  you  have  a  chat  with  him." 

"But  I  might  find  something  out,"  I 
insisted. 

"That  will  be  up  to  the  court-martial 
to-morrow,  my  dear.  In  the  meantime, 
I  '11  have  to  forbid  your  making  any  at- 
tempt to  see  Murdock." 

And  having  pronounced  this  heartless 
ultimatum,  Daddy  lit  his  pipe  and  strolled 
down  the  path  into  the  garden. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

I  DISOBEY  MY  SUPERIOR  OFFICER 

I    SAT  on  the  porch  railing  for  several 
minutes  after  Daddy  left  me,  trying 
to  decide  what  to  do.     I  was  pretty 
sure   that   if  I   told   Father   everything  I 
knew   about   Billy,   he   would   let   me   see 
him ;  but  I  had  promised  not  to  tell. 

Besides,  I  wanted  to  rescue  him  "on  my 
own."  I  could  see  the  grim  court-martial, 
with  Billy,  white  and  trembling,  and  all 
the  officers,  even  my  own  Father,  sternly 
sentencing  him  to  dishonorable  discharge  or 
imprisonment  or  —  even  death,  for  Lieuten- 
ant Porter  might  ^claim  that  Billy  had  ac- 
tually struck  him.  But  I  would  have  dis- 
covered the  secret  of  his  strange  behavior 
and  would  rush  in  just  in  time  to  save  him. 


236  SERGEANT  JANE 

It  would  have  made  a  lovely  movie,  and 
I  had  always  wanted  to  be  a  heroine,  not 
the  dimpled,  curly-haired  kind  but  a  sort 
of  Joan  of  Arc,  forever  being  brave  and 
noble  on  a  white  horse. 

"Alas,"  I  sighed  to  myself,  "it  is  not  to 
be !  I  have  n't  any  horse,  and  I  don't 
know  how  to  get  to  Billy  and  I  have  n't 
the  ghost  of  an  idea  what 's  the  matter 
with  him,  anyhow." 

I  got  up  from  the  railing  and  wandered 
aimlessly  into  the  house.  Mother  had 
gone  out  to  join  Daddy  in  the  garden,  and 
Martha  and  Jimmy  were  over  at  the 
Hunters'.  As  I  passed  the  table,  I  noticed 
a  pile  of  letters  and  papers  and  fingered 
them  idly,  wondering  who  had  met  the 
mail  boat.  There  was  only  one  envelope 
addressed  to  me,  but  it  was  postmarked 
"Peekskill,  N.  Y." 

"Dear  Jane,"  I  read,  when  I  had 
hurriedly  torn  it  open.  "Indeed,  I  do 
remember  you  very  well,  and  I  was  so  glad 


I   DISOBEY   MY   SUPERIOR  OFFICER     237 

to  get  your  letter  —  gladder  than  you  can 
possibly  imagine.  For  it  brought  news 
of  Billy,  and,  Jane,  do  you  know,  it  is  the 
first  news  of  him  we  have  had  for  nearly 
two  years.  We  heard  in  July,  1918,  that 
he  had  been  taken  prisoner.  Before  that 
he  had  been  writing  regularly,  but  neither 
Uncle  James  nor  I  have  had  a  letter  since, 
though  we  found  out  through  the  War 
Department  that  Billy  had  been  released 
after  the  armistice  was  signed. 

"You  can  imagine  how  terribly  anxious 
and  unhappy  I  have  been.  I  had  just 
about  made  up  my  mind  that  he  must 
be  dead,  when  your  letter  came.  It  seemed 
too  good  to  be  true.  But  I  'm  still  unhappy 
because  I  can't  understand  his  not  writing. 
Please  ask  him  to  write  to  me  and  to  Uncle 
Jim  right  away  —  and  won't  you  try  to 
find  out  why  he  has  n't  written  a  word 
all  this  time.  I  have  n't  the  least  idea. 

"I  '11  send  you  a  real  letter  soon,  but  I 
just  can't  wait  to  get  this  off  and  hear 


238  SERGEANT   JANE 

from  Billy.     Thank  you  ever  and  ever  and 
ever  so  much  for  writing  to  me. 

"With  love  to  you  and  to  my  brother, 

"Barbara  Murdock." 

I  read  it  all  through  twice. 

"Now,  I  have  to  see  Billy,"  I  decided. 
"This  is  a  sign." 

I  thought  and  thought  how  I  could 
possibly  manage  it  and  finally  decided 
that  the  best  way  would  be  to  go  down  in 
the  canoe  and  try  to  slip  into  the  passage 
when  the  marine  on  guard  outside  the 
fort  was  on  the  town  side.  Once  inside, 
I  could  prowl  around  until  I  found  Billy's 
cell  and  talk  to  him  through  the  grilled 
opening  when  the  sentry  was  n't  looking. 

It  worked  like  a  charm  as  far  as  getting 
into  the  passage  was  concerned,  and  as, 
flashlight  in  hand,  I  hurried  to  the  door  at 
the  other  end,  I  felt  as  though  I  had  the 
Maid  of  Orleans  and  the  Statue  of  Liberty 
and  all  other  famous  female  heroines 
skinned  a  mile. 


I  DISOBEY  MY  SUPERIOR  OFFICER     239 

With  my  free  hand  I  fumbled  round  my 
neck  for  the  ribbon  on  which  I  always  hung 
the  key.  There  did  n't  seem  to  be  any 
ribbon,  —  but  of  course  I  knew  that  there 
must  be. 

Then  I  suddenly  remembered  that  when 
I  put  on  my  blue  dress  that  afternoon,  the 
neck  had  been  so  low  that  the  key  ribbon 
showed,  and  I  had  taken  it  off  and  put  it 
in  my  bureau  drawer.  I  remembered  it, 
once  my  memory  started  working,  only 
too  well;  but  I  hunted  anyhow  in  all  my 
pockets  and  in  the  blouse  of  my  dress  and 
down  my  back  and  even  in  my  sleeves 
before  I  finally  gave  it  up  and  dropped 
into  a  chair. 

"Of  all  idiots,  Jane  Graves,"  I  assured 
myself,  "y°u  take  the  cake.  Some 
heroine !  Well,  I  suppose  I  '11  have  to 
beat  it  back  to  the  house  and  get  the  key." 

I  started  to  the  entrance,  —  but  after  a 
couple  of  steps  I  came  back  and  sat  down, 
feeling  too  weak  in  the  knees  to  do  any- 


240  SERGEANT  JANE 

thing  else.  I  had  let  the  stone  fall  into 
place  behind  me,  and  I  knew  from  bitter 
experience  that  that  stone  could  only  be 
moved  from  the  outside.  Once  before  I 
had  shut  it  by  mistake  and  had  had  a 
hectic  quarter  of  an  hour  sneaking  out 
through  the  fort  and  coming  back  in  a 
rowboat  to  rescue  the  Sweetheart.  I  dis- 
covered then  that  the  stone  moved  inward 
on  hinges  in  its  right  side  but  could  n't  be 
pulled  toward  you  from  the  inside  because 
there  was  nothing  to  take  hold  of.  It  had 
been  a  lark  that  other  time,  but  now  I 
could  n't  get  into  the  fort. 

"I  'm  n  —  not  a  bit  scared,"  I  told  the 
obstinate  stone.  "Some  one  will  find  me." 

I  could  n't  say  it  very  convincingly, 
though.  Not  a  single  person  knew  of  the 
secret  passage,  and  the  stone  walls  were 
so  thick  that  I  could  shout  for  a  month 
and  not  be  heard,  unless  some  one  came 
into  the  cellar,  which  was  n't  often  visited 
since  it  was  only  used  as  a  storehouse  for 


Horrid  ghostly  echoes  were  the  only  answer.  —  Page  2 


I  DISOBEY   MY  SUPERIOR  OFFICER     241 

junk,  or  unless  I  should  be  able  to  attract 
the  attention  of  the  men  who  came  down 
to  fire  the  battery  three  times  a  day. 
They  had  already  fired  the  evening  salute, 
and  they  took  so  short  a  time  about  it  that 
unless  I  happened  to  strike  just  the  minute 
or  two  before  or  after  the  guns  boomed, 
they  would  n't  do  me  much  good. 

"A  first-class  rescuer,  you  are,"  I  said 
rather  quaveringly,  and  the  sound  of  my 
voice  made  me  feel  worse  than  ever,  so  I 
began  yelling  and  banging  on  the  door  of 
the  cellar.  Horrid,  ghostly  echoes  were 
the  only  answers,  and  when  I  was  hoarse  and 
my  knuckles  were  all  battered  up,  I  sat 
down  again  and  thought. 

I  thought  that  the  Sweetheart  would 
probably  drift  away  as  the  tide  got  higher, 
for  I  had  beached  her  carelessly,  and  then 
some  one  would  find  her  floating  out  to 
sea  and  think  I  was  drowned.  And  I 
thought  what  a  perfect  little  idiot  I  had 
been  not  to  tell  Father  all  about  Billy 


242  SERGEANT   JANE 

instead  of  running  off  and  deliberately 
disobeying  his  orders.  And  I  wished  that 
I  had  never  heard  of  Joan  of  Arc  and  had 
led  a  better  We  generally,  and  wondered 
whether  I  could  die  of  fright  or  slow  starva- 
tion, and  who  would  find  my  bones  years 
later  —  and  then  the  flashlight  went  out ! 

I  thought  I  had  lost  my  voice,  but  I 
had  n't.  All  the  time  that  I  was  frantically 
trying  to  turn  the  light  on  again  and  dis- 
covering that  the  battery  must  be  worn  out, 
I  was  yelling  at  the  top  of  my  lungs.  Then 
I  suddenly  remembered  all  Poe's  stories 
about  people  being  buried  alive  and,  picking 
up  one  of  the  chairs,  I  banged  it  against 
the  cellar  door  until  it  broke  to  pieces 
(the  chair,  not  the  door,  alas !) . 

After  that  I  grew  sort  of  coldly  resigned 
to  my  awful  fate  and  tried  to  say  some 
prayers  and  repent  of  my  sins,  but  I  was 
too  excited  to  remember  any  prayer  except 
"give  us  this  day  our  daily  bread"  and  the 
only  sin  I  could  think  of  was  that  I  had 


I   DISOBEY   MY  SUPERIOR  OFFICER     243 

swiped  the  box  of  chocolates  Lieutenant 
Porter  gave  Martha,  so  I  got  up  again  and 
began  feeling  around  the  walls  in  the  forlorn 
hope  of  finding  another  opening. 

The  stone  was  rough  and  cold  and  hope- 
lessly immovable,  but  I  kept  on  around 
the  room  because  I  could  n't  think  of 
anything  else  to  do.  Suddenly  my  hand 
slipped  into  a  hole  about  on  a  level  with 
my  eyes.  I  gave  a  shout  and  reached 
into  it  frantically  with  both  hands,  but 
it  proved  to  be  only  the  entrance  to  a 
small  pocket  in  the  wall,  which  was  filled 
with  papers.  I  pulled  them  out  angrily, 
not  even  surprised  to  find  them  there,  and 
so  great  was  my  disappointment  that  I 
did  n't  have  the  heart  to  search  any 
farther.  Instead  I  lay  down  on  the  floor, 
buried  my  face  in  a  pillow  and  cried  like  a 
baby. 

"Jane!  Sergeant  Jane!"  some  one  was 
calling.  I  sat  up,  rubbing  the  sleep  out 
of  my  eyes.  I  had  been  having  a  horrible 


244  SERGEANT  JANE 

nightmare,  I  remembered.  My  hand 
touched  something  hard  and  cold ;  it 
was  so  dark  I  could  n't  see  an  inch  in  front 
of  me.  Then  I  realized  that  I  was  really 
in  the  passage,  and  it  was  n't  a  dream  at 
all. 

"Sergeant  Jane,  are  you  in  there?" 

The  voice  was  real,  too,  it  seemed. 

"Here  I  am,"  I  tried  to  shout,  but  it 
sounded  more  like  a  chicken  squawking. 

"What's  the  matter?  Are  you  locked 
in?"  the  voice  demanded.  It  came  from 
behind  the  door  into  the  cellar,  and  I 
groped  my  way  toward  it. 

"How  did  you  know  where  to  find  me  ?"  I 
asked  curiously. 

"Never  mind  about  that  now.  Where  's 
the  key?" 

"In  my  top  bureau  drawer." 

"Sit  tight,  and  I  '11  have  you  out  in  a 
jiffy." 

The  voice  moved  away,  and  I  sat  down 
to  wait  confidently  for  its  return.  Who 


I  DISOBEY  MY  SUPERIOR  OFFICER     245 

was  it  that  had  found  me?  I  wondered.  It 
did  n't  sound  like  Daddy  or  Captain 
Hunter  or  Timmons  or  any  of  the  men  from 
the  barracks.  And  how  had  he  ever  known 
where  to  look?  And  had  it  been  three 
months  or  only  two  since  I  straightened 
out  my  top  bureau  drawer  ? 

In  an  incredibly  short  time  I  heard 
footsteps  in  the  cellar,  and  then  the  joyful 
sound  of  the  key  turning  in  the  lock.  In 
a  glare  of  lanterns  and  flashlights,  as  the 
door  swung  open,  I  saw  Mother  and  Daddy, 
their  faces  white  and  frightened.  Martha 
and  Jimmy  were  there  too  and  a  lot  of 
other  people,  but  Father  had  me  in  his 
arms  before  I  could  see  them  plainly, 
and  the  next  thing  I  knew  I  was  lying  on 
the  couch  in  the  living  room  at  home,  not 
quite  sure  how  I  had  reached  there,  the 
lights  had  been  so  blinding  after  being 
shut  up  in  the  pitch  dark. 

"Oh,  Dad,  I  'm  so  sorry,"  I  apologized, 
sitting  up  so  that  I  could  see  him  better. 


246  SERGEANT  JANE 

"I  disobeyed  you  and  was  trying  to  get  to 
Billy,  and  it  served  me  right;  but  it  was 
awful  to  be  locked  in  there  and  think 
there  was  n't  any  one  who  knew  where  to 
look  for  me !  Who  thought  of  my  being 
there?" 

"I  did,  Sergeant,"  a  familiar  voice 
answered,  and  I  looked  up  to  see  Lieutenant 
Duncan  striding  across  the  room. 

"Why,  where  did  you  come  from?"  I 
demanded,  staring  at  him  rudely. 

"Came  in  on  the  New  York  boat  this 
evening  to  take  charge  of  the  Com- 
mission's marine  escort,"  he  replied,  grin- 
ning cheerfully.  "Mills  got  sick  at  St. 
Croix.  It  was  a  darn  good  thing  for  you 
he  did,  too,  young  lady.  I  prophesied 
that  you  would  open  that  door  for  me  some 
day,  but  it  turned  out  the  other  way." 

"They  found  the  Sweetheart  bottom  thide 
up  down  by  the  drydock,"  Jimmy  broke  in, 
adding  blithely,  "Gee !  Sis,  we  thought  you 
were  drowned  for  sure  !" 


I   DISOBEY  MY  SUPERIOR  OFFICER     247 

"We  had  all  the  launches  and  rowboats 
out  and  every  man  in  the  barracks  scouring 
the  shore,"  Martha  took  up  the  tale. 
"Then  Lieutenant  Duncan  happened  to 
heah  about  it  at  the  hotel  and  found  where 
you  were  and  came  back  for  the  key  and 
us.  Why  did  n't  you  evah  tell  us  about 
the  passage,  silly?" 

"Did  you  find  any  buried  treasure ?" 
Jimmy  inquired  with  renewed  interest. 
"What 's  that  in  your  hand  ?" 

I  looked  down  in  surprise,  not  realizing 
that  I  had  been  clutching  something  in  my 
left  hand.  "Ugh!"  I  shuddered.  "They 
are  some  horrid  old  papers  I  found  in  a  hole 
in  the  wall  —  after  the  light  went  out."  I 
shuddered  again  as  I  remembered  the 
feeling  of  the  cold  stone  all  around  me, 
and  threw  the  packet  of  letters  on  the 
floor. 

"Let 's  look,"  cried  Jimmy  eagerly, 
grabbing  them  as  they  fell.  "Let 's  read 
'em." 


248  SERGEANT  JANE 

"Not  now,  son,"  Father  said  quietly. 
"Give  them  to  me  and  we  '11  look  them 
over  to-morrow.  It  's  after  midnight,  and 
we  must  all  go  to  bed." 

Mother  packed  us  off  upstairs  and  in- 
sisted upon  making  Lieutenant  Duncan  a 
bed  on  the  couch. 

"Indeed  you  will  stay  with  us,"  I  heard 
her  insisting,  "not  only  to-night,  but  all 
the  time  you  're  here.  When  I  think  how 
we  would  be  feeling  now  and  where  Jane 
would  be  if  you  had  n't  come  — "  She 
broke  off  abruptly  and  pretended  to  be 
very  busy  fixing  the  pillows  on  the  couch. 

"Yes,  but  remember  I  was  responsible 
for  her  knowing  about  that  damn  —  I  beg 
your  pardon,  Mrs.  Graves;  that  slipped 
out  —  that  dangerous  place,  and  it  would 
have  been  my — "  Lieutenant  Duncan's 
voice  trailed  off  into  an  unintelligible 
murmur  as  he  followed  Mother  into  the 
kitchen. 

I  called  to  Father  when  he  came  upstairs, 


I   DISOBEY   MY   SUPERIOR  OFFICER     249 

and  he  came  and  stood  in  the  door  of  my 
room. 

"I  want  to  tell  you,  Daddy,"  I  said, 
trying  to  sound  unconcerned,  "that  I 
think  you  should  break  me  —  demote  me, 
you  know.  Nobody  ought  to  be  a  ser- 
geant who  can't  obey  orders." 

"Just  as  you  say,  Jane,"  he  replied 
gravely.  "But  you  will  tell  me  all  about 
it,  won't  you?" 

"To-morrow,"  I  promised,  standing  on 
tiptoes  to  kiss  him  goodnight. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

BILLY  EXPLAINS 

we  weren't  the  only  ^ones  who 
knew  about  the  passage,  after  all," 
Lieutenant  Duncan  said,  grinning 
at  my  woebegone  expression  as  I  folded 
up  the  last  letter  and  stuck  it  back  into 
the  packet. 

We  had  all  —  all,  that  is,  except  Daddy, 
who  had  gone  into  town  to  see  the  Com- 
missioners off  and  arrange  a  few  days' 
leave  for  Mr.  Duncan  —  been  spending 
the  early  morning  out  on  the  porch, 
investigating  the  papers  I  had  found  in 
the  wall  of  the  secret  passage. 

There  were  a  dozen  letters,  mostly 
written  in  German  which  Martha  and  the 
Lieutenant  between  them  managed  to 


BILLY  EXPLAINS  251 

translate,  several  sheets  of  memoranda 
and  a  small  map.  Jimmy's  hopes  revived 
at  the  sight  of  the  map,  and  he  was  all 
prepared  to  start  off  on  a  treasure  hunt, 
but  it  proved  to  be  nothing  but  an  ordinary 
colored  map  of  the  Virgin  Islands  with  a 
great  many  small  black  crosses  on  it  in 
different  places. 

The  notes  were  disconnected  words  and 
figures  that  Lieutenant  Duncan  decided 
represented  statistics  as  to  the  population, 
imports  and  such  things  of  the  islands. 

The  letters  were  all  written  by  a  German 
soldier  who  signed  himself  "Franz",  and 
addressed  to  either  "Hebe  Mina"  or  "my 
dear  brother."  The  envelopes  had  evi- 
dently been  destroyed,  and  there  was  no 
clue  to  any  of  the  people's  surnames. 
The  letters  themselves  told  for  the  most 
part  of  the  writer's  experiences  in  the 
trenches,  and  there  were  many  bitter 
allusions  in  those  of  later  date  to  the 
"traitorous  Americans"  who  had  "come 


252  SERGEANT   JANE 

into  the  war  on  the  wrong  side."  In  some 
of  the  letters  to  "brother"  there  were 
instructions  for  stirring  up  the  negroes  of 
the  islands  against  the  English  and  Amer- 
icans and  for  sending  information  back  to 
Germany.  The  last  letter  was  dated 
October,  1918. 

"Yes,  we  Ve  found  out  that  some  one 
else  knows  about  our  passage,"  I  agreed, 
"but  that 's  about  all  we  have  found  out. 
These  might  have  been  exciting  enough 
two  years  ago,  but  they  're  all  out  of  date 
now.  Isn't  that  just  my  luck!" 

"I  think  they  're  still  interesting," 
Mother  remarked,  looking  up  from  her 
sewing.  "You  know  there  was  quite  a 
little  secret-service  work  done  here  during 
the  war  by  the  marine  officers.  They  found 
several  spies  and  made  some  pretty  rigid 
investigations,  and  most  of  the  Germans 
suddenly  became  Danish  or  Swiss.  Major 
Elliot  was  here  then,  and  he  was  telling  me 
about  it  the  other  night." 


BILLY  EXPLAINS  253 

"  Evidently  some  devoted  admirer  of  the 
Kaiser  did  n't  wish  to  have  any  incriminat- 
ing evidence  found  on  his  person,"  Lieu- 
tenant Duncan  suggested,  tapping  the 
letters. 

"Well,  he  had  a  good  hiding  place,"  I 
admitted.  "I  wonder  why  he  did  n't  get 
them  back  after  the  war  was  over." 

"Probably  the  fort  was  a  little  too  well 
guarded  to  make  it  worth  his  while  to 
bother  about  them." 

"I  'd  love  to  know  who  they  are, 
would  n't  you  ?  There  are  still  such  a 
lot  of  Germans  on  St.  Thomas  that  we 
could  never  find  them." 

"I'll  look  out  for  Mina  and  for  Franz 
and  his  brother,"  Jimmy  promised.  "I  'd 
sort  of  like  to  be  a  detective,  I  think. 
Say,  that  Franz  was  a  nice  chap,  wasn't 
he?" 

"  Horrible ! "  Martha  shuddered.  "  Is  n't 
the  calm  way  he  tells  about  murdering 
those  women  and  children  ghastly?" 


254  SERGEANT  JANE 

"What  struck  me  as  the  crudest  thing 
of  all,"  Lieutenant  Duncan  remarked,  "is 
his  description  of  the  trick  they  played  on 
that  poor  Yank  prisoner.  Where  is  that 
letter?" 

Just  as  he  found  it,  Father  came  up  the 
path  and,  after  stopping  for  a  minute  to 
assure  the  Lieutenant  that  the  Com- 
missioners thought  they  could  get  along 
without  him  for  two  more  days,  he  put 
his  arm  through  mine  and  walked  me  into 
the  house  with  him. 

"Now  tell  me  all  about  everything,"  he 
ordered,  as  I  curled  up  on  the  couch  beside 
him. 

So  I  began  at  the  beginning  and  told  him 
all  I  knew  or  imagined  about  Billy  Mur- 
dock,  and  finally  I  ran  upstairs  and  brought 
down  Barbara's  letter  for  Father  to  read. 

"Get  your  hat,"  he  said,  when  he  had 
finished  the  letter.  "  We  're  going  to  call 
on  Murdock  without  another  minute's 
delay." 


BILLY  EXPLAINS  255 

We  found  Billy,  looking  white  and  miser- 
able, sitting  on  the  cot  in  his  cell. 

"We  've  come  to  have  a  little  talk  with 
you,  Murdock,"  Father  began  quietly,  as 
he  returned  Billy's  salute.  "May  we  sit 
down?" 

"Yes,  sir,"  replied  Billy  nervously. 

So  Daddy  sat  down  beside  him  on  the 
cot,  and  I  sat  on  the  wooden  stool  in  the 


corner. 
« 


I  want  you  to  believe  that  we  're 
your  friends,  Murdock,"  Father  began. 
"We  'd  like  to  help  you  if  we  possibly  can, 
but  I  don't  believe  we  can  do  anything 
unless  you  're  willing  to  be  perfectly  frank 
with  us." 

Billy  started  to  answer;  then  broke  off 
and  buried  his  face  in  his  hands. 

"If  it  will  make  it  any  easier  for  you  to 
talk,"  Father  assured  him  kindly,  "I  can 
promise  that  if  you  do  not  wish  it,  nothing 
you  say  to  us  shall  go  any  further.  Jane 
has  told  me  that  you  have  been  unlike 


256  SERGEANT   JANE 

yourself  down  here,  and  if  you  're  in  trouble, 
she  wants  to  help  you  —  and  so  do  I." 

"You  're  too  good  to  me,  sir,"  Billy 
muttered,  not  raising  his  head.  "But 
there  's  nothing  you  can  do." 

Father  looked  at  me  despairingly  and 
shook  his  head  as  though  he  thought  it 
was  a  hopeless  task. 

I  made  up  my  mind  that  I  would  at  least 
make  him  show  signs  of  life. 

"Billy,"  I  said.  "Here  's  a  letter  from 
Barbara." 

He  jumped  to  his  feet  so  suddenly  that 
we  both  started. 

"Where?"  he  asked  hoarsely.  "Show  it 
to  me.  What  does  she  say?" 

"If  you  '11  sit  down  and  listen  quietly," 
I  bribed,  "I  '11  read  it  all  to  you." 

While  I  was  reading,  his  eyes  never 
left  my  face,  but  when  I  had  finished,  he 
whispered  "God  bless  her"  and  covered 
his  face  again.  I  thought  that  he  was 
crying  and  was  hoping  that  Daddy  would 


BILLY   EXPLAINS  257 

think  of  something  to  say,  when  suddenly 
he  stood  up  again.  His  face  was  whiter 
than  ever,  but  there  were  no  signs  of  tears, 
and  he  held  his  head  high. 

"I  think  I  'II  tell  you,  sir,"  he  said  to 
Father  very  quietly.  "  It 's  been  too  much 
for  me  to  keep  to  myself.  You  see  how 
I  've  had  to  treat  my  sister,  who  is  dearer 
to  me  than  anything  in  the  world.  I  Ve 
let  her  think  me  dead  —  and  I  want  her 
to  think  so  again  —  rather  than  to  know 
that  I  'm  —  a  traitor !" 

He  shuddered  at  the  last  word  but  did  n't 
break  down.  Father  reached  up  and  pulled 
him  back  to  the  cot. 

"Now,  tell  me  all  about  it,  my  boy,"  he 
said  gently,  putting  an  arm  around  Billy's 
shoulders.  This  unexpected  kindness  was 
too  much  for  the  boy,  but  he  finally  con- 
trolled himself  and  told  his  story. 

"I  was  with  the  4th  Regiment,  Company 
A,  in  Belleau  Woods,  sir,  as  you  know.  I 
had  only  been  with  them  a  few  days  — 


258  SERGEANT  JANE 

came  up  with  some  replacements.  My 
buddy  —  Jim  Wilson  —  went  West  our 
first  day  up.  It  got  me  rather  badly.  I 
guess  I  was  still  pretty  shaky  from  the  flu. 

"One  night  we  went  out  —  a  patrol  of 
six  men  —  to  try  to  find  out  if  the  Boches 
were  planning  an  attack.  Our  bit  of  line 
was  very  weakly  held  —  more  replacements 
had  been  due  but  had  n't  gotten  through 
—  and  our  only  hope  was  that  the  Boche 
would  n't  discover  our  weakness. 

"We  got  across  No  Man's  Land  without 
any  trouble,  but  within  a  few  feet  of  their 
trenches  somebody  made  a  noise,  and  in  a 
second  a  dozen  Fritzies  were  on  top  of  us. 
I  remember  a  huge  form  towering  over  me 
and  a  whizzing  sound.  When  I  came  to,  I 
was  lying  in  a  sort  of  dugout,  and  a  fat 
blonde  Boche  was  holding  my  head  as 
tenderly  as  if  I  'd  been  his  best  girl." 

Billy  stopped  a  minute,  breathless.  It 
was  the  first  time  he  had  told  his  story, 
and  he  seemed  to  be  living  it  over  again. 


BILLY  EXPLAINS  259 

Neither  Father  nor  I  made  a  sound,  and 
soon  he  went  on. 

"I  couldn't  guess  why  he  was  being  so 
kind  to  me,  and  he  surprised  me  even  more, 
for  as  soon  as  he  saw  my  eyes  were  open,  he 
grinned  at  me  horribly  and  grunted,  'Well, 
Mr.  Yank,  how  feel  you  by  now  ?  Ve  are 
very,  very  grateful  to  you,  yah !  You  haf 
don  us  one  great  favor.' 

"I  could  n't  imagine  what  he  was  driving 
at  and  told  him  so. 

"Then  he  said  —  I  can  see  him  leering 
now  —  *  You  pretend  you  don't  remember, 
heh  ?  You  don't  want  your  friends  to  know 
you  betrayed  them,  nein  ?  Nefer  mind  all 
that ;  you  told  us  where  to  attack,  so  we 
haf  your  live  saved.  Ah-hah  —  dey're  off ! ' 

"'You're  a  liar!'  I  shrieked  furiously. 

"I  would  n't  believe  it  —  I  would  n't  let 
myself.  It  made  me  physically  sick  just 
to  think  about  it.  But  the  Germans  were 
certainly  attacking,  and  the  man  who  led 
me  back  to  the  detention  camp  knew  all 


260  SERGEANT  JANE 

about  it  and  told  me  that  the  rest  of  my 
patrol  had  been  killed  and  my  life  alone 
spared,  in  return  for  the  information  I  had 
given.  The  other  prisoners  heard  about  it 
and  ostracized  me. 

"I  still  kept  hoping  against  hope  that  it 
was  n't  true,  but  when  the  armistice  was 
signed  and  I  came  back  to  my  company, 
I  found  that  the  Boches  had  made  a  sur- 
prise attack  that  night  and  killed  the 
captain  and  over  thirty  men.  I  feel  as 
though  I  had  murdered  them.  Even  if 
I  betrayed  them  unconsciously,  that  only 
makes  the  thing  worse ;  it  proves  I  'm  a 
coward  and  a  traitor  at  heart.  Now  you 
know  what 's  been  the  matter  with  me ! 
Now  you  know  — " 

"Billy!  Billy!"  I  shouted.  I  had  had 
my  mouth  open  for  two  minutes,  but  not 
a  sound  had  come  before.  "Billy,  you 
did  n't  betray  them  at  all !  I  know  all 
about  it.  That  awful  old  Boche  made  it 
all  up  and  wrote  to  his  brother  about  it." 


BILLY  EXPLAINS  261 

Billy  and  Father  stared  at  me  wild-eyed. 

"It  was  just  a  trick  he  made  up  to  get 
even  with  you  because  he  hated  all  Ameri- 
cans for  coming  into  the  war,"  I  hurried  on 
breathlessly.  "It 's  all  in  one  of  those 
letters  I  found  in  the  passage.  Franz,  his 
name  was,  and  they  knew  about  your  line 
being  weak  and  had  that  attack  all  planned 
before  they  ever  saw  you.  It  was  just  his 
idea  of  a  practical  joke  — '  another  example 
of  their  despicable  Kultur '  Lieutenant  Dun- 
can called  it.  So  you  're  not  a  traitor  at 
all,  Billy;  you're  not!" 

They  still  stared  at  me  in  bewilderment, 
although  Billy's  face  had  lightened  wonder- 
fully, and  I  had  to  explain  in  minutest 
detail  all  about  the  letters  I  had  found,  one 
of  which  contained  the  account  of  just  such 
a  trick  as  had  been  played  on  Billy. 

"But  how  can  you  be  sure  it  was  me  he 
wrote  about?"  Billy  asked  doubtfully. 

"Of  course  it  was,"  I  protested  stoutly. 

"It  seems  quite  likely,"  Father  agreed, 


262  SERGEANT  JANE 

"and  even  if  it  were  n't,  I  'm  sure  that 
Billy  had  the  same  thing  happen  to  him." 

"Are  you  really?"  the  boy  questioned 
eagerly.  "You  don't  think  me  a  traitor, 
sir?  You  won't  discharge  me  from  the 
marines  ?  " 

"I  'd  be  willing  to  stake  my  last  cent  on 
your  loyalty,"  Father  assured  him  gravely, 
"but  not  on  your  discretion.  Whatever 
made  you  insult  Lieutenant  Porter?" 

Billy's  happy  smile  vanished.  "I  had 
forgotten  that,  Colonel,"  he  confessed.  "I 
think  I  must  have  been  half  crazy.  I  was 
almost  mad  worrying  over  this  thing  and 
being  ashamed  to  let  my  sister  know  I  was 
alive  or  to  have  any  friends.  I  was  begin- 
ning to  think  I  could  n't  stand  it  another 
minute  —  and  when  I  saw  that  Boche  get 
off  the  boat  I  did  n't  — " 

"That  Boche?"  Daddy  and  I  repeated 
in  chorus. 

"Yes,  the  one  who  made  me  his  prisoner. 
That 's  the  man  I  was  talking  to  on  the 


BILLY  EXPLAINS  263 

wharf.  I  was  trying  to  find  out  the  truth  of 
it  all,  and  he  pretended  not  to  remember 
me.  Then  I  got  so  excited  that  I  forgot 
where  I  was  and  who  Lieutenant  Porter 
was  and  everything  else.  I  could  n't  think 
of  anything  except  getting  that  dirty  Boche 
to  talk." 

"Father,"  I  cried  excitedly,  "Timmons 
told  me  that  German's  name  was  Franz 
Zeitler,  and  the  man  who  wrote  the  letter 
was  named  Franz  and  they  both  have 
relatives  here  at  St.  Thomas.  It  must  be 
the  same  man !" 

"That  would  be  a  lucky  coincidence!" 
Daddy  exclaimed.  "Your  Franz  went  on 
with  the  boat,  but  we  can  trace  him  through 
the  people  he  visited  here.  That  will  prove 
your  innocence  unquestionably,  Murdock, 
although  I  haven't  the  slightest  doubt  of 
it  myself  without  further  proof.  I  will 
explain  the  whole  thing  to  the  other  officers, 
and  I  'm  sure  you  will  be  let  off  with  a  light 
penalty." 


264  SERGEANT  JANE 

"I  can't  thank  you,  Colonel,"  Billy 
began,  but  Father  cut  him  off  with  a  hearty 
"Good-by  and  good  luck",  for  he  hated  to 
be  thanked. 

"  Say,  Sergeant,"  he  called  after  me  shyly, 
as  we  started  out,  "I  wonder  if  you  could 
get  me  some  paper.  I  want  to  write  a 
letter." 


CHAPTER  XIX 

SEMPER  FIDELIS 

MOTHER  was  doing  her  hair  one 
afternoon  several  days  later  when 
I  dropped  down  on  her  bed,  being 
careful  not  to  muss  the  shams. 

"Are  you  going  to  the  dance  to-morrow 
night?"  I  asked  carelessly. 

"Of  course,  dear,"  she  answered  absently, 
sticking  a  big  bone  hairpin  into  place. 
"  It 's  the  last  thing  given  for  the  Com- 
mission, and  it 's  up  to  us  to  be  there." 

"Us?    Joshua,  not  the  whole  family!" 

"Oh,  no,"  Mother  laughed.  "I  hardly 
think  that 's  necessary.  I  'm  going  to  take 
Martha  —  although  she  does  n't  know  it 
yet  and  has  nearly  pestered  me  to  death  — 


266  SERGEANT  JANE 

but  I  think  you  and  Jimmy  may  be  ex- 
cused." 

"Maybe  I  could  stand  it  this  once,  if 
you  think  it 's  my  duty.  I  suppose  it 
would  be  politer  to  the  Commissioners  for 
us  all  to  be  there." 

I  tried  to  look  like  a  would-be  martyr, 
but  I  evidently  did  n't  succeed  very  well, 
for  Mother  started  to  laugh. 

"Jane,  Jane,"  she  gasped,  wiping  her 
eyes,  "since  when  have  your  duties  weighed 
so  heavily  upon  you  ?  It 's  mighty  sweet 
and  unselfish  of  you  to  offer,  and  I  appre- 
ciate your  willingness  to  undergo  this 
hardship  for  the  sake  of  the  family  honor 

—  but   I   don't   really  believe   it    will    be 

\ 

necessary." 

Then  I  realized  that  she  was  n't  to  be 
deceived,  so  I  gave  up  diplomacy  and  threw 
myself  on  her  mercy. 

"I  want  to  go  to  that  dance,  Mother. 
Please  let  me,"  I  begged. 

I  teased  and  coaxed  and  pleaded  for  half 


SEMPER  FIDELIS  267 

an  hour,  and  Mother  just  smiled  her  most 
beamish  smile  and  murmured,  "Remember 
Norfolk?"  and  "Next  time  will  be  never," 
and  "What  about  the  silly  fops?" 

Then  I  began  making  promises.  I 
promised  never  to  fight  with  Jimmy  or 
Martha,  and  always  to  be  on  time  to  meals, 
and  to  get  ninety  in  all  my  lessons  and  eat 
string  beans  and  learn  to  sew  and  straighten 
my  bureau  drawers  once  a  week  and  never, 
never  say  "Oh,  Joshua!"  —and  finally  she 
said,  "Well,  just  this  once.  But  never 
again  until  you  are  seventeen.  Now  run, 
dress  for  dinner." 

I  went  halfway  across  the  hall  and  then 
back  and  stuck  my  head  in  the  door. 

"What  do  you  think  about  wearing  my 
hair  up  ?  "  I  suggested  brightly. 

"I  don't  think  about  it  at  all,  you  ridic- 
ulous child.  Why,  when  I  was  fourteen  - 

I  did  n't  wait  to  hear  the  rest ;  I  knew  it 
would  be  discouraging.  Instead  I  went 
and  looked  at  myself  in  Martha's  long 


268  SERGEANT  JANE 

mirror.  I  was  n't  exactly  tall,  I  had  to 
admit,  and  I  was  rather  thin,  —  slender 
sounded  better,  or  willowy.  But  looking 
facts  squarely  in  the  eye,  I  felt  positive 
that  except  for  the  babyish  Russian-blouse 
dresses  Mother  made  me  wear  and  the 
childish  length  of  my  hair,  which  was  just 
below  my  shoulders  and  had  ends  that 
curled  up  and  made  it  look  even  shorter, 
except  for  these  unfair  handicaps  I  looked 
every  day  of  fifteen  ! 

I  had  a  darling  new  pale-green  dress, 
made  of  some  soft  shimmery  stuff,  with 
a  really  low  neck  and  almost  no  sleeves, 
and  best  of  all  a  broad  satin  sash  instead 
of  an  everlasting  old  patent-leather  belt. 
In  that  dress  I  might  even  look  sixteen !  — 
except  for  my  hair.  I  pulled  the  comb 
through  the  tangles  crossly  and  ran  down 
to  dinner. 

The  dance  was  to  be  in  the  court,  and  all 
the  next  day,  after  the  grass  had  been  cut 
as  short  as  possible,  the  men  rolled  it  until 


SEMPER  FIDELIS  269 

it  was  as  hard  and  smooth  as  a  prize  putting 
green.  A  platform  was  put  up  at  each 
end,  one  for  our  own  band  and  one  for  an ' 
orchestra  from  the  town,  and  Japanese 
lanterns  were  strung  on  wires  all  around 
and  across  the  lawn. 

Jimmy  and  I  had  to  oversee  all  the 
preparations  and  that  —  and  other  things 
—  made  me  a  little  late  getting  dressed. 

"Are  n't  you  evah  coming  down,  Jane  ?" 
Martha  kept  calling  up  the  stairs. 

She  was  out  on  the  porch  with  a  whole 
bunch  of  lieutenants  who  were  fighting 
over  her  program  and  fussing  with  our 
own  lanterns  which  would  n't  stay  lighted. 
I  did  n't  see  why  she  had  to  bother  about 
me,  and  I  stayed  upstairs  just  as  long  as 
I  wanted  to.  To  be  perfectly  frank,  I  was 
a  tiny  bit  scared  to  come  down. 

Finally  I  took  a  long  breath  and  ran 
down  the  stairs.  Mother  and  the  Hunters 
and  several  of  the  Commissioners  were  in 
the  living  room,  for  the  music  had  n't  started. 


270  SERGEANT  JANE 

Mother  never  raises  her  voice  —  at  least 
she  says  a  lady  never  does,  and  she  usually 
practices  what  she  preaches  —  but  I  guess 
she  forgot  for  a  minute. 

"Jane!"  she  shrieked.  "Jane  Graves! 
What  have  you  done  to  your  hair?" 

"Bobbed  it,"  I  answered  calmly,  though 
my  knees  seemed  a  little  nervous.  "Don't 
you  like  it?" 

"Like  it?    Like  it?" 

She  seemed  to  be  overcome,  —  and  I 
was  n't  sure  that  it  was  with  pleasure. 

"What  evah  made  you  do  it,  Jane?" 
inquired  Mrs.  Hunter.  "You  Ve  been 
having  such  a  time  ovah  getting  it  long." 

"It's  a  bit  impressionistic,  isn't  it?" 
Captain  Hunter  chuckled.  "Or  perhaps 
it 's  Bohemian !" 

I  had  done  the  cutting  myself  with  my 
manicure  scissors,  and  maybe  it  was  n't 
exactly  even,  but  there  was  nothing  to 
make  such  a  fuss  over  that  I  could  see. 

"C  —  can  anything  be  done?"  Mother 


SEMPER  FIDELIS  271 

asked  weakly,  shutting  her  eyes  as  though 
she  did  n't  want  to  look  at  me. 

"I  don't  know,  but  I'll  try,"  Mrs. 
Hunter  offered  cheerfully.  "Come  on, 
Jane,  let  me  trim  you  up  a  bit." 

She  marched  me  back  to  my  room  and 
clipped  around  my  head  with  scissors  and 
a  comb  for  perfect  centuries.  At  last  she 
stood  off  and  looked  me  over. 

"Theah,  now,  you  look  civilized  at  least," 
she  announced.  "I  really  think  you  look 
mighty  cute,  but  don't  you  dahe  tell  you' 
Mothah  I  said  so,  oah  she  '11  think  I  en- 
couraged you  in  the  fihst  place.  What 
evah  made  you  do  it,  Jane?" 

"Well,  I  'II  tell  you,"  I  decided,  taking 
a  look  in  the  mirror  and  discovering  that 
I  did  look  less  Bolshevistic  than  before 
Mrs.  Hunter  trimmed  me  off.  "Mother 
wouldn't  let  me  put  my  hair  up  for  the 
dance,  and  I  looked  so  young  with  it  hang- 
ing over  my  shoulders  that  I  decided  to 
bob  it.  Lots  of  grown  people  bob  their 


272  SERGEANT  JANE 

\ 

hair,  so  no  one  can  tell  how  old  I  am  now, 
can  they?" 

Mrs.  Hunter  fluffed  out  my  hair  on  both 
sides  and  kissed  me  before  she  answered. 

"You  ah  always  original,  Jane,"  she  said, 
laughing.  "And  you  look  at  least  twenty- 
five  !  I  'm  only  glad  you  did  n't  decide 
you  wanted  to  be  sixty  and  bald !" 

By  the  time  I  reached  the  court,  it  was 
almost  filled  with  the  Commissioners  and 
the  officers  of  their  escort  and  our  own 
officers  and  more  town  people  than  had 
ever  before  been  invited  to  a  barracks 
dance. 

The  music  was  great  —  military  time 
at  one  end  and  St.  Thomas  jazz  at  the 
other  —  and  I  was  glad  when  Bob  Duncan 
suddenly  appeared  from  somewhere  and 
hustled  me  on  to  the  floor. 

"  What 's  this  ?  What 's  this  ?  "  he  cried, 
as  we  passed  under  one  of  the  lanterns. 
"Going  back  to  our  childhood  days? 
That 's  the  way  you  looked  at  Norfolk." 


SEMPER  FIDELIS  273 

"Oh  —  don't  you  think  it  makes  me 
look  older?"  I  inquired  anxiously. 

"Una-m,"  he  pondered  deeply.  "I  'd 
hardly  say  older,"  he  decided,  crushing 
heartlessly  my  fondest  hopes.  "At  least 
not  much.  This  afternoon  you  were  a 
demure  little  girl  about  eight  years  old, 
and  now  you  look  like  a  mischievous  small 
boy  of  nine." 

My  spirits  fell  greatly  at  this  blow,  but 
they  could  n't  stay  fallen ;  I  was  having  too 
good  a  time.  The  Cleret  boys  were  there, 
and  most  of  Martha's  lieutenants  thought 
they  would  make  a  hit  with  her  by  dancing 
with  her  "baby  sister",  and  even  if  they 
were  patronizing  they  knew  some  dandy 
new  steps,  and  so  did  Lieutenant  Duncan. 
And  when  I  went  over  to  get  some  punch, 
and  Billy  smiled  at  me  proudly  from  behind 
the  bowl  and  pointed  to  a  corporal's  chevron 
on  his  sleeve,  I  was  so  happy  I  wanted  to 
squeal. 

After  the  next  dance  I  slipped  back  to 


\ 

274  SERGEANT   JANE 

shake  hands  with  Billy.  He  was  grinning 
from  ear  to  ear. 

"Won't  Barbara  be  glad?"  he  demanded, 
wringing  my  hand.  "  I  owe  it  all  to  you  and 
your  Father,  Sergeant.  I  can't  thank  — " 

"Don't,  Billy.  We  didn't  do  anything, 
but  we  're  both  as  proud  as  Punch  of  you." 

"Do  you  know  what  the  Colonel  said  to 
me,  Sergeant?  He  said,  'Murdock,  you 
know  the  meaning  of  Semper  Fidelis,  of 
course?'  'Yes,  sir,'  I  told  him.  *  It  means 
always  on  the  job,  sir.'  'Right,'  he  said. 
'You  've  been  faithful  as  a  private,  Mur- 
dock ;  now  I  want  you  to  be  even  more  so 
as  a  corporal." 

"  I  'm  sure  you  will,  Billy,"  I  assured 
him,  shaking  hands  again.  Then  I  hurried 
back  to  dance  with  the  least  portly  of  the 
Commissioners,  and  I  was  so  amused  at  the 
sight  of  Billy  ladling  lemonade  on  to  the 
table  in  absent-minded  bliss  that  I  actually 
enjoyed  it  —  the  one-step,  I  mean  —  with 
the  Commissioner. 


SEMPER  FIDELIS  275 

It  was  all  over  lots  too  soon,  and  Lieuten- 
ant Duncan  walked  back  to  the  house  with 
me  to  say  good-by,  for  the  Commission  was 
leaving  for  St.  John  on  the  early  morning 
boat,  and  he  had  to  hurry  back  to  the  hotel 
to  set  the  alarm  clocks  and  pack  the  bags ! 

"Why  can't  such  good  times  last?" 
I  demanded,  as  we  sat  down  on  the  couch 
hammock  to  wait  for  the  others.  "Was  n't 
it  fun?" 

"It  was  bully !  But  you  '11  have  lots  of 
other  times  just  as  good.  Remember  that 
night  at  Norfolk?  You  never  dreamed 
then  that  you  'd  like  St.  Thomas  so  much, 
did  you?" 

"I  should  say  not,"  I  had  to  acknowl- 
edge. "I  hated  to  leave  Norfolk.  But 
now  I  love  it  here  even  more.  It 's  the 
nicest  home  we  Ve  ever  had  —  and  we  '11 
have  to  leave  it  like  all  the  others !" 

"Yes,  but  the  next  place  will  probably 
be  even  nicer." 

"Maybe !    Sometimes,  though,  I  feel  like 


276  SERGEANT  JANE 

a  girl  without  a  country.  Other  girls  have 
homes  that  are  homes,  and  friends  that 
don't  get  sent  away  as  soon  as  you  begin  to 
know  them.'* 

"Oh,  I  don't  feel  a  bit  that  way  about 
it,"  Bob  disagreed,  very  much  in  earnest. 
"The  whole  blessed  United  States  is  our 
home  ;*  we  know  all  of  her,  even  to  her 
smallest  colonies,  while  the  poor  stay-at- 
homes  just  know  one  little  corner  of  New 
England  or  Iowa  or  Texas  and  think  of 
that  as  their  country." 

"Why,  I  never  thought  of  it  that  way," 
I  cried,  delighted.  "That 's  a  great  idea, 
Bob.  And  we  have  our  own  friends,  too, 
in  all  parts  of  the  country,  and  we  're 
always  meeting  new  ones  and  coming 
across  old  ones." 

"Which  is  the  nicest  thing  of  all,"  he 
grinned  at  me.  "Here's  hoping  that  our 
next  'coming  across'  will  be  soon." 

"And  that  next  time  I  get  in  a  scrape, 
you  '11  appear  to  pull  me  out,"  I  added. 


The  whole  blessed  United  States  is  our  home."  —  Page  276. 


SEMPER  FIDELIS  277 

Then  Daddy  and  Mother  and  Martha 
came  up  on  the  porch,  and  we  all  said 
good-by  and  promised  to  write. 

"We  'H  walk  down  to  the  gate  with  you, 
Lieutenant,"  Father  offered,  slipping  his 
arm  into  mine,  "to  wish  you  one  more 
'good  luck.'" 

After  he  had  gone,  we  stood  together  at 
the  gate,  watching  the  tall  white  figure 
disappear  into  the  darkness  of  the  road. 

"Have  a  good  time  to-night,  Sergeant 
Jinks?"  Daddy  asked,  pulling  one  of  my 
abbreviated  locks. 

"Scrumptious,"  I  assured  him.  "But 
you  must  n't  call  me  Sergeant  any  more." 

"No?  Why  not?  Are  you  planning  to 
disobey  orders  again,  or  do  you  want  a 
commission  ?  " 

"You  bet  I'm  not  — and  don't,"  I 
declared  fervently. 

Father  sometimes  forgot  to  correct  me 
when  I  used  unladylike  expressions. 

"  In  that  case,  I  think  you  can  have  your 


278  SERGEANT   JANE 

rank  restored,"  he  said  gravely.  "But 
you  know  a  sergeant  in  the  Marines  must 
be—" 

"Semper  Fidelis,"  I  interrupted.  "Well, 
I  had  to  promise  to  be  that  and  more  too 
before  Mother  would  let  me  come  to  the 
dance  to-night !  Oh,  Josh  —  I  mean  — 
Oh,  my  goodness  me !  I  'm  just  naturally 
going  to  turn  into  an  angel  of  peace  instead 
of  a  fighting  marine!" 

"I'm  not  worrying,"  Daddy  laughed. 
"Not  so  long  as  your  name  is  Jinks !" 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  UeRARYFAOUTY 


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